


Desperate

by marysutherland



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-16
Updated: 2013-04-29
Packaged: 2017-12-05 11:57:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 32,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/723036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marysutherland/pseuds/marysutherland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a simple reason why Lestrade puts up with Sherlock...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [second_skin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/second_skin/gifts).



> Many thanks to [The Small Hobbit](http://thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com/) for betaing.
> 
> The timeline of this story reflects an attempt to make some sense of the mess that is Series 2 chronology, and was adapted from suggestions originally made by [Mad Maudlin](http://mad-maudlin.livejournal.com/1030139.html). She produced a timetable in which some of the events of _Hounds_ and _Fall_ took place during the whole year covered by _Scandal_. I've combined this with another suggestion (whose original source I can unfortunately no longer locate): that _Hounds_ takes place before the Christmas party in _Scandal_ , because Mrs Hudson's 'new dress' in _Hounds_ is the one she's wearing then. In summary, this fic has the events of _Hounds_ taking place in the summer of 2010, before Sherlock meets Irene. The significance of this will eventually be revealed...

Sometimes Greg couldn't help thinking it would have been better if he'd never met Sherlock Holmes. If he could somehow travel back in time and ensure that they avoided one another, that Sherlock found some other police officer to hassle, maybe everything would have worked out differently? He wouldn't be sitting alone in a crummy flat in Deptford with no job and no marriage. And Sherlock wouldn't be dead.

Stupid to think like that, he told himself. He'd always known that Sherlock wouldn't make old bones, that his brilliance would burn itself out in some spectacular way. And as for his own marriage, it hadn't really been Sherlock that had wrecked it. The first cracks had already been there long before he met Sherlock, even though obviously, he'd made things worse. Just as Mr Morgan – _Gareth_ – had only been a lightning conductor for Ruth's discontent. It had never been going to work out the way it was supposed to. _Happily ever after_ didn't really apply to coppers, especially not detectives. The job always wrecked your personal life.

***

As far as Greg could remember, it had started with the Hayes murder. Everyone on the investigation had been sure Geoffrey Hayes had killed his wife and kids, but they hadn't been able to crack his alibi. They'd all been obsessed by the case, but DS Lestrade, angling for a transfer to a Major Incident Pool, had been the most obsessed. Driven Ruth up the wall talking about it. But then how could you deal with a "family annihilator" when you were expecting your first child in a month's time?

That had been when he'd started splitting his life up into compartments. He and Ruth had always been a team, and now suddenly they weren't. He couldn't explain to her why he _had_ to solve this case, had to prove that not all men were like Hayes. And Ruth – maybe it was just because the pregnancy was rough, that she was turning in on herself. In bed, she talked to the bump now more than to him.

Ruth had worked out what to do, of course. She'd told him almost calmly, after a week or so of sleepless nights, that it'd be easier for them both if she stayed with her mother for a few days. It meant Greg didn't need to worry about being out all hours, hunting down the man – somewhere, someone – who had helped Hayes. He also knew, even though Ruth didn't say it, that she wanted someone at hand who had time to take care of her, because she was stressed about the pregnancy. That was the problem with being a nurse – she knew too much about all the things that could go wrong with babies, couldn't switch off a mind alert to subtle symptoms of imminent disaster.

Two hours after Hayes had been charged, Greg went round to Mrs Hall's. He sat in the kitchen with her and Ruth and Ruth's sister, Jenny, as they talked about birth plans and breast pumps, and he tried not to wince. And later that evening, Ruth had smiled at him, in a slightly preoccupied way, and said it had been a nice holiday, but she couldn't wait to be back home. He'd imagined then that everything would go back to how it had been before. Surely having a family wouldn't change things that much?

***

"You have three children: a boy of seven, a girl of five and an unweaned baby," Sherlock announced, three hours after he first met Greg. "And your wife no longer loves you. Probably because the last child was unexpected."

"You're a pick pocketing junkie," Greg retorted, "and if you don't give me back my wallet in the next thirty seconds, with all the cash still in it, I _will_ arrest you."

"You had only to ask," Sherlock said, and produced the wallet with a flourish from inside the long coat he was wearing. Greg was surprised he hadn't sold _that_ yet. God knew the boy must be down on his luck to be living in a dump like this squat in Hackney.  Even if he did sound like he came from a posh family.

Greg started checking carefully through the contents of his wallet.

"You didn't ask how I knew about your family," Sherlock remarked. He talked to Greg as if he'd known him for years. In actual fact, he'd charged into Scotland Yard for the first time ever earlier that afternoon and somehow charmed Greg into helping him prevent a murder.

"There are photos in the wallet," Greg replied. "You're observant, I'll give you that. If you got cleaned up, you might make something of yourself yet."

"Boring," Sherlock announced, and Greg told himself that he should just walk away from this skinny kid. No reason he should be staying talking to him, finding out more. There was paperwork to be done, and he needed to get home on time. He'd promised Ruth he wouldn't be late. He slid a glance at his watch. He could maybe manage ten minutes more here.

"Are there any friends you could go to, help you out?" he asked. "Maybe even give you a square meal?"

Sherlock shook his head.  "And if your wife no longer loves you, you hardly want to take me home and feed me up," he added.

"Stop saying that," Greg grumbled, and couldn't understand why he still felt sorry for the kid, when he was such a prick. "You don't know anything about me."

"You have traces of dried vomit down the back of your left shoulder," Sherlock announced. "Unless you have some very unusual friends, that means you've recently been holding a baby and the mother didn't think it worthwhile cleaning you up properly afterwards. Five-year gap from the last child, and there are photos of your two older children in your wallet, but none of your wife or the new baby. Implies the child was unexpected and you're ambivalent about it. Another baby after five years and your wife doesn't care if you go to work with vomit stains on you; she obviously no longer loves you."

"Wait till you're married," Greg said savagely. "Wait till you have kids. You'll realise it's not as simple as that." It wasn't that he didn't care about Emily, it was just they hadn't got round to having any decent pictures taken. And Ruth hadn't wanted _her_ photo taken for years, claimed she looked old and tired and fat. Yes, Ruth and him were having a rough patch, but it was only to be expected. If things would only just settle down, it would all be fine. It was just hard to manage with his job.

***

Greg hadn't expected to see Sherlock again, but the boy had picked up a lot of information on the streets and he seemed to have decided to become Greg's personal informant. Well, he was already more than an informant, but he could be explained away to Greg's superiors as one. So Greg could justify buying him a few square meals out of petty cash. Keeping him going for a few more months before the inevitable disaster. An addict who poked his nose into other people's criminal business wasn't going to survive for long. Even one as clever as Sherlock. Nothing Greg could do though: it was already clear that Sherlock didn't listen to anyone. Particularly not him.

***

 It all went pear-shaped six months later, when Greg went off to Manchester on a three-day course. When he switched his phone back on in the evening he had forty-three texts waiting, forty-one of them from Sherlock. Well, he could just wait his turn for once, he decided, and dialled Ruth. As the phone rang, he tried to get his head in the right place to make helpful comments about costumes for Rob for Red Nose Day, and Emily's attempts at standing, and Ruth and Katy's little _problem_. But when Ruth answered, she announced:

"There's a strange man been coming round asking for you."

"What does he look like?" Greg demanded, on instant alert.

"Young, tall and thin with black hair, and wearing a long black coat."

"Did he sound posh?" He was sure that he'd never told Sherlock his home address, but Sherlock had pick-pocketed him enough that he'd probably worked it out.

"Yes," Ruth replied. "He said he had to talk to you, and it was urgent, but you weren't answering your phone."

"Oh god, I'm sorry. Did he scare you?"

"No, of course not." Ruth's voice was brisk. "It takes more than some weedy junkie to scare me. I told him to find someone else at Scotland Yard, but he said no-one else there would listen to him. And when I went out later, he was hanging around on the street. Maybe he didn't believe me when I told him you were away. But you need to do something about it."

"Of course," he said, and wished fervently that it was something that could involve strangling Sherlock.

***

A read through of Greg's text messages revealed that Sherlock had found a corpse and wanted to show it to Lestrade personally. It was like having a bloody cat, Greg thought, slightly hysterically trying to calculate which would be more disastrous: leaving Sherlock playing with a body for two more days or racing home from Manchester, which would just encourage him. In the end, half against his better judgement, he sent Donovan, his new sergeant, round to talk to Sherlock.

By the time Greg got back, the Met had a murderer in custody, and he had an extremely pissed-off DS. He took one look at Sally Donovan's scowl and recognised a bomb that needed defusing urgently.

"Come and have a drink," he said. "You've earned it." Ruth wasn't going to be pleased about him being home late again, but at least _she_ wouldn't try and apply for a transfer away from him.

***

"I'm sorry, Sally," he said, when they were sitting in the pub. "I should have warned you about Sherlock." He had told her "user" and "abrasive", and she was doubtless used to what addiction could do to someone's personality. But more and more he got the feeling that Sherlock wasn't a jerk because he was on drugs; he was on drugs because he was a jerk.

"I'd heard you had a pet junkie, sir," Sally said, starting on her pint. "I didn't imagine anything like _him_. What the hell does he think he's playing at?"

"I have no idea," Greg replied. "I've known him for six months and I still don't understand him. Why does he have to keep on winding people up?"

"Because he knows he can get away with it," Sally said, a fierce look coming over her tough, beautiful face. "Don't worry. I'm....I'm used to arseholes who think they're so bloody superior to me."

Sally didn't need protecting, Greg reminded himself, or at least she wouldn't accept him trying to protect her.  He drank his beer silently, watching her, and eventually she sighed and said:

"The problem is he's an arsehole who _is_ bloody superior."

"What do you mean?"

"That's why you put up with all his bloody crap, isn't it? Because he's cleverer than us, as well as rich and posh and good-looking–"

"You think he's good-looking?" It had never occurred to him that Sherlock looked anything but strange.

"He's bloody gorgeous," Sally said, and there was an anger there that Greg didn't understand. "And he's throwing away everything, just for kicks."

"You reckon he's going to end up overdosing, do you?" he said, because maybe he wasn't just getting paranoid.

"No," she said with absolute conviction. "He's gonna end up killing someone else. When the drugs don't give him a buzz any more, he'll try violence."

A sudden thought struck Greg.

"Did you take a constable with you, when you went with Sherlock to find that body?"

"He said it had to be just me, there wasn't room in the drain for anyone else. What would you have done?" Sally's chin went up and there was nothing to say. Because if it had just been him and Sherlock, it wouldn't have been any safer. Sherlock could doubtless polish him off, if he really wanted to.

"I reckoned you'd have noticed if he was a pervert," Sally went on. "Or a vampire." Black humour: the refuge when someone had come close to really, really fouling things up.

He'd been putting his faith – and other people's lives – in the hands of an unstable addict, working with Sherlock. It needed to stop, he decided abruptly, before someone got hurt.

***

He told Ruth when he finally got home that Sherlock wouldn't bother her again.

"I thought he was helping you solve crimes?" she said sceptically. "That's what matters to you, isn't it?"

"He's no use to me when he's off his face half the time," Greg replied. "And it's not my job to straighten him out. Some other idiot can try that."

***

Greg knew as soon as he saw the tall, smartly-dressed man standing in his office a fortnight later that he was connected to Sherlock. Not just the air of entitlement, but the way the man's eyes scanned the room. Logging every detail, deducing and filing away for future reference every one of Greg's secrets.

"Good morning, DI Lestrade," the man said, extending a well-manicured hand. "I'm Mycroft Holmes, from the Home Office. Well, attached to it, at least. I understand you've been employing my brother as an informant."

"I did for a bit," he growled, waiting to be told that Holmeses weren't supposed to be grasses, it wasn't cricket.

"What would it require for you to take him back on? Employ him as a consultant this time?"

"What the...hell are you talking about?" He stayed where he was by the door and stared suspiciously at Mycroft, hoping the man would take the hint and leave.

"My meaning is surely clear enough. My brother's skills at detection are far superior to those of the Metropolitan Police. Yet you are the only man on the force who has the sense to realise that basic fact." Mycroft paused and then added: "You need Sherlock and I can supply him; the rest is open to negotiation."

"And suppose Sherlock doesn't want to be _supplied_?" Greg replied, with a suddenly vivid awareness of why Sherlock might have turned to drugs.

"He wants this," Mycroft answered, staring patronisingly down his nose. "And you need him. What's the problem? I can arrange things with your superiors, if that's your worry."

"I don't _need_ you pulling strings." He didn't want to have this conversation. There was something about the passive-aggressive smoothness of Mycroft that made him long to have Sherlock back in his place; at least he felt entitled to yell at him. He forced his jaw to unclench, and said, as patiently as he could: "Sherlock has personal problems. I decided he wasn't in a fit state to help us."

"Ah, it is the drugs that are the problem," Mycroft replied, smirking. "I thought given your own experiences – nicotine addiction, I mean, nothing illegal – you might be more sympathetic. Suppose I deliver Sherlock cocaine free to you in the New Year. Could you make use of him?" The smirk broadened. "In any way that occurs to you."

"We don't do work placements," Greg snarled, and decided that maybe if he ignored Mycroft Holmes, he'd go away. He went over to his desk, digging out a file from the heap. He immediately couldn't help thinking: _If Sherlock was here he could help with this_. Hugh Boone had vanished from his pitch begging in Upper Swandam Lane in the East End, and his tattered, blood-stained clothes had been found shoved inside a bin-bag next to a nice respectable semi in Lee Green. No trace of Boone himself, though, and Greg's superiors were already dropping hints that the mysterious disappearance of a homeless man was not a _policing priority_.

"Oh, you hardly need Sherlock's help for a case as simple as that," Mycroft said, and Greg realised he stupidly hadn't kept the file name hidden. "Look for the journalist on Burnt Ash Hill and you've found your man."

"What do you mean?" Neville St Clair, next to whose house the clothes had been found, was the founder of some half-arsed independent media company. But what did that have to do with anything?

"The man who lived as a beggar for a year in order to get a best-selling book out of it," Mycroft said, his eyebrows quirking. "Or just possibly a controversial Channel 4 documentary. You do need Sherlock, Inspector; I hope you can be persuaded to make use of his talents." He walked out of the office, and Greg decided that now wasn't the day to try giving up smoking.

_How did you know that the beggar with the twisted lip was Neville St Clair in disguise?"_  Greg texted that evening to the phone number he'd found left as his screensaver.

The reply came back promptly: _Surely it was obvious? MGH_. For one minute, he seriously considered asking Mycroft if the Home Office could spare him for a few months. Then he reminded himself that he'd probably strangle the man within a fortnight. Sherlock was going to be a difficult enough proposition.

***

He ought to warn Ruth, he supposed, but he wasn't sure what to tell her. Still, when she dutifully asked him about his day that evening, he muttered something about possibly working with Sherlock Holmes again.

"Oh," Ruth replied, and Greg couldn't fathom the expression that came over her strong, sensible face.

"If he cleans himself up," he said hastily. "Could be a big help for my team then, if I can handle him right."

"I see," she said, and added, with an effort at enthusiasm: "That'd be good, if he makes things easier for you."

"You won't have to have anything to do with him. I'll make sure he understands my house is off limits."

"Do you know what he said, that time I met him?"

Greg shook his head. He hadn't asked; he hadn't wanted to know the details, in case he'd been tempted to carry out an act of police brutality.

"He told me," Ruth announced, glaring at Greg, "that medicated shampoo wouldn't clear the nits, and that wet-combing would be far more effective if I cut my hair short."

Her long tawny hair was Ruth's one vanity; he knew how much the head lice episode had pained her in every way.

"Sherlock will be a different man when he's off drugs," he lied, and Ruth sighed and shrugged and hurried off to stop Emily picking at the spot on the lounge wall where he had mucked up the wall-papering.

Had Sherlock sat down and planned how best to upset Ruth, Greg wondered, heading to the fridge for a beer, and then realised that it was worse than that. He'd come round that time wanting something from Greg, hadn't he? God help him, Sherlock had probably been trying to be helpful. Now that was a truly terrifying thought.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock may be off drugs, but that doesn't make him easier for Lestrade to handle...

Greg hadn't planned to spend Twelfth Night in a bar with an attractive man. Though that made it sound more enjoyable than it actually was. Mycroft had phoned to announce that Sherlock was fit for duty and Greg had decided that it was time to introduce him properly to his investigation team.

It wasn't quite as stupid as it sounded. DC Noel Taylor was having a belated birthday party, and everyone was still vaguely positive at having survived the Christmas holidays. Some of his team had possibly even made New Year's resolutions about being more co-operative. Give them a brief dose of Sherlock to inoculate them, rather than introduce him during the stress of a crime scene, and they might accept him. And if Sherlock _wasn't_ clean, Greg could simply tell Mycroft to get stuffed.

When Greg got to the bar, he spotted Sherlock sitting silently in a corner, and wondered abruptly why he'd never realised before how handsome he was. Tastes varied obviously – there were even people who thought he was good-looking, rather than just a harassed, greying plod – but the oddness of Sherlock's looks seemed to have dissolved away. Maybe it was just he was calmer off the drugs. It probably helped as well that he was wearing some kind of smart designer clothes that emphasised the lean, graceful lines of his body. He still didn't look normal, obviously, but he looked a good kind of abnormal, not "secretly a serial killer". And when Greg went over to meet him, Sherlock gave him his usual hard stare, but somehow refrained from telling him he'd put on weight over Christmas and that he'd already broken _his_ New Year's resolution about quitting smoking. In fact, Sherlock was giving a good impression of someone tolerable.

"Have a good Christmas?" Greg asked, sipping at his scotch.

"I spent it with Mycroft," Sherlock said in a low voice, and Greg had a sudden vision of the pair of them glaring at each other over Christmas dinner. And then Sherlock added: "Detoxing. He claimed it was the only time he could spare to supervise me."

Greg's second New Year resolution had been to cut down swearing. That was obviously a lost cause.

"Oh, fucking hell," he said. "And you agreed?" He'd seen enough forced treatments to know exactly how unsuccessful they were.

"Mycroft said you wouldn't work with me unless I was clean," Sherlock said, and his tone defied sympathy.

"That's right," Greg said. "So if you're not ready, I'd understand. I mean it's hard enough getting off the coke, but it's harder staying off."

"I want this," Sherlock said, and he sounded like Rob explaining why he had to have exactly the right Doctor Who figure for Christmas and nothing else would do. Sherlock was older than he looked; Greg had worked out that he must be nearly thirty. But he was still a child in some ways. A damaged, dangerous child, and Greg shouldn't feel sorry for him.

"It's not going to be easy," he replied. Maybe if he laid things out clearly now, something would register with Sherlock. "A murder investigation's a team game, like football. One person can't do it all themself. It's not just a puzzle to solve: it's securing the evidence, proving it in court. Taking care of the paperwork, so your case doesn't unravel." He looked at Sherlock. "I don't need you to do that; but you gotta understand it _has_ to be done."

" 'The Yard lead the world for thoroughness and method'," Sherlock murmured. "Well, that was what someone claimed back in 1924. I hardly think it's true now."

"If we're so crap, why do you want to work with us?"

"Because if I have something to entertain me, I don't need the drugs."

"Investigating murders isn't done for your bloody entertainment," Greg protested. _Don't let him wind you up_ , he told himself.

"If you don't enjoy it, why do you do it?" Sherlock said. "Oh, I know the obvious reasons. Because you need to feed your family.  Because it's a job that's useful to society, and you have a strong sense of justice. But why you really solve murders, Lestrade, is because it's more fun than arresting speeding motorists."

They were saying on the telly that the government were going to ban smoking in bars, but they hadn't done so yet, thank god. Greg lit up a fag and didn't punch Sherlock, and then he saw Sherlock's greedy eyes on the packet and gave him one as well. Couldn't break too many bad habits all at once.

"Your team are over in the corner," Sherlock said. "One depressive, one sociopath, three dolts, and DS Donovan. Oh, and a civilian with a beard and marital problems."

"Ten minutes talking to them," Greg said. "Be polite. You're the cleverest man I know. You can do that."

"I'm the second cleverest man you know," Sherlock said. "You've met Mycroft. I leave tactfulness to him."

Greg gave him a long, slow stare. You had to spell out the consequences sometimes with kids.

"I can't give you what you want unless you co-operate," he said. "You know that."

Something must have registered, because he abruptly watched Sherlock becoming _nice_. His upright posture relaxed into gawkiness, a shy smile appeared on his face, and somehow there was now warmth in those pale, clever eyes. A harmless young man, trailing awkwardly after Greg to be introduced.

Noel and Kath Climpson were their normal cheery selves as Greg introduced them; Bailey was gazing slightly awkwardly at them and blushing – he hoped it was Sherlock she was admiring and not him. Even Donovan managed an unconvincing smile. And then there was Anderson, with his new beard and his old prickliness.

"I looked at your website at lunchtime, Mr Holmes," he said. " _The Science of Deduction_ , you call it, don't you?"

"And?" Sherlock asked, going very, very still beside Greg.

"You've done a lot of work on tobacco ash identification, I see."

"Yes."

"If you want us professionals to pay attention, you should submit your research to a journal. If you think it'll stand up to peer review."

Greg had a strong suspicion that was the scientific equivalent of a dog putting back its ears and snarling. He was hardly surprised when Sherlock smiled an evil smile and said: "So did your wife leave you for good over Christmas, Dr Anderson, or is she claiming it's just a trial separation?"

***

It could have been worse, Greg told himself, sitting on the tube on the way home. Anderson hadn't thumped Sherlock. _He_ hadn't thumped Sherlock. They hadn't even got banned from the bar, not after Sherlock had pointed out to the manager the member of staff who was giving short measures. And it wasn't as if most of his team actually _liked_ Anderson, though Sally Donovan had a soft spot for him. But he'd have to try and keep Sherlock away from Anderson in the future. Prats, both of them. He was disappointed in Sherlock, even though he knew he shouldn't be.

And he couldn't help feeling a twinge of sympathy for Anderson. No fun for anyone having your marriage disintegrate, let alone having Sherlock comment on it. He could still remember how miserable those remarks about Ruth had made him feel. Could have been him that Sherlock was deducing, not Anderson, if things had been different.

No, it wasn't going to be. Christmas had gone smoothly this year; everything was going fine. Ruth had been so organised, known precisely how to sort the kids out, keep things under control. Him and her, they made a good team.

Unfortunately, even if they were a team, he thought, as he let himself quietly into his house – everyone else tucked up in bed already – he was definitely the weakest link. If Ruth was the officer in charge of the family, he was the equivalent of the dim DC you desperately hoped would be assigned to other duties. But that was the New Year's resolution he _was_ going to keep: pulling his weight looking after the kids.

***

The problem was he always seemed to screw up when he did try to help.  His shifts were impossible to mesh neatly with the complex schedule that filled his growing children's lives. And when he _was_ the one who took them somewhere, Rob promptly lost his football shorts, or Emily had hysterics because she'd been given the wrong sort of milk to drink at the soft play area. He seemed to be crap at looking after his own children; it was Ruth they wanted with them, not him. Easier to linger at the office, where at least he just had Sherlock rolling his eyes at his stupidity, not his own wife.

***

It turned out that having Sherlock to consult didn't save Greg much time on cases. Well, it saved time solving them, but that was counterbalanced by all the time spent smoothing over the mess that Sherlock left behind. He'd had to ask Mycroft Holmes for help several times, and one of those days the bastard was surely going to collect on those favours.

Still, he was starting to realise the true art of consulting Sherlock. Going to him only for the really tricky cases, because otherwise he'd just refuse to help. And it was funny how often just the suggestion of bringing in Sherlock got his team suddenly re-motivated and tracking down the correct culprit. They'd do _anything_ to avoid Sherlock's maddening presence.

He didn't mind Sherlock any more, most of the time. Oh, the man had zero social skills, and he could be a complete dickhead at times. But even though Sherlock would never admit it, he needed some kind of steadying influence, a focus to prevent his life spiralling into chaos. Maybe Greg was a crap father to his own kids, but he still found himself hoping that eventually he would have some effect on Sherlock. And it was perversely satisfying meanwhile not letting Sherlock get to him, proving that he could rise above the man's provocations. DI Lestrade, after all, was surely old enough and ugly enough to cope with anything.

***

Coping with anything included the fact that he wasn't going to be promoted to DCI. Charlie Luke, his old guvnor, sitting in his retirement home, had been the one who spelt that out.

"Course not, Greg," he said, grinning. Luke's smile was still vivid, even though he was shrunken and frail now. "It's basic statistics, isn't it?"

"What do you mean?"

"While you stay an inspector, they can stick different DCIs over you theoretically in charge of an investigation, and everyone's clear-up rate benefits. If you made it to chief inspector, you'd look brilliant, and everyone else would look shitty, and there'd be hell to pay."

"You reckon that's their plan?"

"That's the way the game works," Luke said, sketching a complex design of zig-zags with his hands. "Not saying it's right, but since when did being the best at anything get you ahead? Competent and inoffensive, that's the ticket. And your other problem, Greg, is if your pal Sherlock decides he wants to make a name for himself, showing up the police as idiots."

"He won't," Greg said. "He's not interested in publicity."

"If he sold his story to the paper, he could get thousands," Luke said. "Better watch your back, Greg, or it'll end in tears."

***  

His hair was going grey and the DCs on his team were looking younger, he realised a couple of years on. Hell, _everyone_ was looking younger: Mark Dimmock was clearly aiming to become a DI while still in nappies. But there were some constants. He still had Sally Donovan as his sergeant, and he couldn't imagine now having anyone else. Anderson's marriage was still limping along, and it was a bit like that old joke: as long as Anderson and his wife didn't split up and remarry, they only made two people unhappy, rather than four.

The other constant now was Ruth talking about Dorset. Her parents had moved down near Dorchester when they retired and to her it was everything that London wasn't: safe, clean, beautiful. A place where you could bring up children properly.

"They'd be bored out of their minds," Greg protested. "I grew up in the countryside. We sat in the bus shelter and smoked all evening, that was our idea of fun. Well, apart from the psycho kids who liked torturing small animals."

"Dorset CID are based in Winfrith," Ruth said. "They'd welcome someone with your experience. You'd get the promotion you deserve."

She didn't say: _You'd be away from Sherlock Holmes_.  She didn't need to. To Ruth, Sherlock had become all she hated about Greg's work: the single-minded obsession, the disruption, the black humour. She thought Sherlock was a bad influence on Greg and maybe she was even right. But all three kids were at school now, and there was a gap between toddler tantrums, and the teenage angst he knew would come. It was going to be OK, he told himself, he knew it was.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If he let this go, that was it, Greg knew. Every hold on Sherlock broken, if he covered this up...

What fouled up a marriage, of course, wasn't always the known unknowns. Sometimes it was the things that you couldn't possibly predict: like the Southwark baby boom of the late Nineties and James Phillimore killing himself.

There were too many eleven year-olds in Southwark and Rob didn't get into the nearest secondary school, but one halfway across the borough. In between muttering about the excellent schools in Dorset, Ruth comforted Rob and scheduled meetings with teachers and made plans to improve matters. Greg listened patiently and tried to make helpful suggestions, and got pitying glances from Ruth and Rob at his failure to understand the situation properly.

There were some things Greg did understand, though.  That there was something _wrong_ about James Phillimore's suicide. A teenage boy killing himself was hardly unusual. Even the fact that his family and friends hadn't spotted anything wrong was tragic, but commonplace. But when young men decided to kill themselves, they jumped off bridges, or hanged themselves, or gulped down alcohol and painkillers. They didn't take bloody alkaloid poisons. Someone had given Phillimore that drug, and Greg wanted to know who. No-one else did. The file was closed and he brooded about it all over Christmas. He felt he'd let the kid down, but what he needed was some hard evidence.

What he _didn't_ need was a junior transport minister dying and all hell breaking loose. Not to mention Sherlock screwing up the press conference for him. He could make a fool of himself on his own, thank you very much. But it didn't stop him calling in Sherlock as the corpses started to mount. Because what did it matter if he sounded desperate, when he ran up the stairs to 221B and asked Sherlock "Will you come?" What did anything matter as long as there were no more dead bodies?

 He didn't even throw a wobbly when Sherlock brought his new flatmate along to Lauriston Gardens, like it was some sort of tourist attraction. But when Sherlock promptly buggered off without telling him _or_ Dr Watson anything, he decided it was time to get control of the operation again. Show Sherlock that there were still some limits.

The drugs bust turned out to be surprisingly informative. There was a spy camera hidden in the sitting room, which suggested that either Mycroft or Sherlock himself was up to something particularly devious. Sherlock also dyed his hair, and was obsessive about organising his clothes, if not spare body parts. Dr Watson, meanwhile, was a decorated ex-army officer who was _not_ sleeping with Sherlock. Well they had separate bedrooms, at least. Why anyone would choose to live with Sherlock if they weren't shagging him, Greg had no idea.

He did soon have an idea of why Sherlock might want Dr Watson around, however, when he saw them together later that night. Sherlock not just talking to the doctor, but _listening_ to him.  As if he'd finally found someone whose good opinion he valued. It was probably sentimental of Greg, but he couldn't help telling Dr Watson that evening that Sherlock might yet become a good man, as well as a great one.

No, forget that. It wasn't sentimental, it was utterly stupid. Because what did John Watson promptly go and do an hour later? Shoot somebody with a fucking illegal handgun.

***

"You're looking for a man with nerves of steel," Sherlock announced, standing there with that stupid blanket round him, and then his mouth came to a dead stop. It took a hell of a lot to shut Sherlock up, but when Greg's gaze followed Sherlock's, he knew who could. The small, mostly harmless looking figure of Dr John Watson.

_Christ_ , he thought, and then Sherlock started lying to him about being in shock. Maybe it wasn't a lie, though, because he felt like he'd gone into shock himself. _I should do something_ , he told himself, even as he let Sherlock walk away, towards the man who'd just saved his life by ending another's.

_This isn't bloody Afghanistan._ If he let this go, that was it, he knew. Every hold on Sherlock broken, if he covered this up, turned a blind eye to what was going on. But if he arrested Dr Watson, that was the end as well. He'd saved Sherlock's life, after all. Greg couldn't have saved Sherlock; he hadn't saved Beth Davenport or Jennifer Wilson or James Phillimore. And Sherlock had found them the killer. Sherlock was the only weapon Greg had sometimes, and maybe John Watson was now Sherlock's weapon.

_It's too late, anyhow_ , he told himself, but he knew that was a lie. He could go back to 221B tomorrow and look for evidence against Dr Watson, pull him in for questioning, and then leave the outcome to the Crown Prosecution Service. They might well not prosecute for the cabbie's death, but if the gun was his, he was looking at an immediate jail sentence.

If John Watson went to jail, Sherlock would never forgive Greg, but so what? You broke the rules, you paid the penalty. That was what life was like. The funny thing was, he suspected Dr Watson understood that. It was Sherlock who didn't have to deal with the consequences of his actions, who relied on always having someone to look after him.

And sure enough, here on cue was Mycroft Holmes, with his smart suit and his glamorous assistant. Greg bet neither of them had ever been to an FE college before.

"Don't say anything," he growled, when the pair stood in front of him. "Or I may change my mind."

Mycroft flicked a glance at his PA, who promptly stepped back, looking as uninterested as ever.

"You might change your mind about what?" Mycroft enquired, with a bland smile that made Greg want to punch him. "Is my brother being awkward?"

Greg crossed his arms, and stood there and said nothing. Which was absolutely sod all use with a Holmes, of course.

"Just now I met Dr Watson," Mycroft drawled. "His hand wasn't shaking and he had an inadequately concealed gun about his person. I take it he's done something rash?"

"Sherlock was about to take poison, when someone shot the serial killer."

"Would it help if I told you that Dr Watson was authorised to carry his gun?"

"I wouldn't believe you."

"Why not? You know what I'm able to do."

"If John Watson was working for you, Sherlock would have kicked him out of the flat within ten minutes."

"Good point, Inspector. But, nevertheless, if you or any of your team should be tempted to arrest Dr Watson, you'll discover he has a handgun license. He has _always_ had that license."

"So I've got no choice?" Greg said.

"You have the choice of hitting your head against a brick wall or not doing so."

He found himself wondering what would happen if he _did_ thump Mycroft. Would his PA just stand there vacantly as usual or would she break his arm?

"I wasn't gonna charge him anyhow," he said at last.

"I know." Mycroft smiled an infinitely irritating smile. "I was merely making the point that your decision was the correct one."

"Reckon so?"

"You may not _want_ Sherlock, but you still need him. I had hoped that Dr Watson would be good for my brother, but I may be wrong. Still, I'm sure things will work out for the best. Good night, DI Lestrade. Sleep well."

***

He went home to Ruth and told him Sherlock had caught a serial killer, and he didn't want to talk about it. She hugged him as he lay in bed beside her, and he told himself that somehow he would make things OK.

***

Greg pulled rank shamelessly and got the February half term off, only to find that Rob was having football camp all week with Mr Morgan.

"Right," he said. "He's one of the PE teachers at the school, isn't he? Is he the skinny one or the vicious looking thug?" He'd turned up late to the last parents' evening, and it had all gone downhill from there.

"He's wonderful," Ruth said. "He's given Rob so much confidence about everything. Don't worry, I can ferry Rob around. I just need you to keep an eye on the girls."

By the end of the week, thanks to Katy, Greg was ready to go on _Mastermind_ with Justin Bieber as his specialist subject. Emily, meanwhile, had taught him how to bandage the paw of an injured tiger, though he suspected it was trickier with a real tiger than her stuffed toy. She'd decided this year she was going to be a vet, not a doctor, which at least meant she no longer felt the need to bandage _him_ up.

He got back to work to find Mark Dimmock was a hero for breaking up a Chinese smuggling ring, and he didn't care. If Sherlock was OK working with someone else, it was fine by him.

***

But a month later there was a funny case, and Sherlock liked those. More than that, it rapidly became the kind of case where Greg _needed_ Sherlock. An improbable puzzle and an impossible deadline; if anybody was going to stop the pips bomber before someone died, it was Sherlock.

Greg stood in 221C Baker Street, rattling out orders to his team, and then braced himself to phone Ruth.  To say he would be busy all weekend, but not why. If it got out there was a bomber running rings around the Met there'd be complete panic.

"You said you'd be free on Saturday afternoon," she yelled. "Why is a cold case suddenly so important that it can't wait?" He listened, as she angrily poured out details of arrangements that would have to be altered. She'd have to sort out the swimming lessons and the ballet as usual. But Mr Morgan – Gareth – had found some old football programmes that Rob might want, and she'd promised Rob that they'd go and look at them on Saturday afternoon, while Greg looked after Emily and Katy...

"Can't you all go over to see Gareth Morgan?" he suggested, and Ruth yelled at him some more. Too many months of minor failures as a father, all coming out suddenly in one huge lump of Ruth's hurt. He stood there, with a twelve-hour deadline ticking down, trying to soothe her, conscious of Sherlock switching his attention from the trainers to him. As if there was some vital piece of data to be added to his memory bank: _Example of middle-aged couple arguing no. 314._

Greg finished the call at last and turned to the nosy detective. No time to try and explain or excuse himself, so he asked one simple question:

"What do you need to help you solve this?"

***

They were about eight hours down, when Greg went out for a smoke and realised he'd had a text from Ruth. He focused his tired eyes on the screen:

_If you're going to be working late, suggest you stay at Stan's, rather than trekking all the way home. R_

Greg had kipped on DI Stanislaw Hopkins' sofa a few times in the past, when London transport had got completely fouled up. He'd never had Ruth suggest him doing that before. He sighed and went back to trying to trace Carl Power's former classmates.

***

After a while, the days started to blur together. Had Connie Prince been day 3 or 4, Greg found himself wondering, as the nightmare of countdowns continued. He woke up and there was another body – a dead man on a freezing stretch of the Thames. And a few hours later – or was it a day, or a year? – Ms Wenceslas giving them a name at last. Moriarty.

Greg had real nightmares on Stan's sofa that night: the hostage's voice echoing through the gallery no longer an unknown boy's but Emily's, begging her father to help. He chased after a dream Sherlock, pleading with him to come back, to tell him the answer. Maybe Ruth had been right saying he was better off not coming home, he thought at half six the next morning, as Stan patiently fed him toast and tea, and told him he was going to give himself a heart attack if he didn't slow down.

"There's another pip to come," Greg protested. "Last of five, so it's gotta be something big."

"What's this Moriarty up to?" Stan asked, through a mouthful of toast. "Why's he doing all this?"

"Dunno," Greg said. "I've no idea what the fuck is going on. I just hope Sherlock has."

"You're still working with Sherlock Holmes? Christ. You're really in the shit, Greg."

"No-one else can do what he does."

"Maybe," Stan said. "But I still wouldn't work with him, coz you know things will get fouled up somehow."

"I trust him," Greg said, and Stan sighed and handed him some more toast.

***

Greg wasn't sure he _could_ trust Sherlock, after what happened next. Nothing. When he got back to the Yard that morning there was still no word from the bomber. It gave them a chance to catch up, try and get ahead before the final hostage was taken.  Maybe even stop that happening, get this maniac Moriarty before he did...something. He texted Sherlock to see if he'd made any progress overnight, but there was no reply. Not even the usual _Thinking_ or _It would help if you banned the playing of Radio 1 in Baker Street while I'm on a case._

When there was still no reply by mid-afternoon, his nerve cracked and he went round to 221B. He rang the doorbell and eventually the door opened. Sherlock stood there, blocking Greg's way in.

"You need more than one person to carry out a drugs bust," he announced, his pale grey eyes staring into Greg's, as if he was trying to hypnotise him.

"I need your help."

"I'm busy."

"What Moriarty's going to do next?"

"Nothing."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean," Sherlock said, "that the game is over."

"So where is he?" Greg demanded. "He killed twelve people in Glasgow, Sherlock. We have to track him down."

Sherlock just stood there, not replying. He looked like some strange, beautiful statue, and Greg had a sudden terrible urge to grab the man, shake some sense into him. Shit, that was how you gave someone brain damage, wasn't it? Or was that just with babies? He forced his hands to stay down, his mouth to stay shut.

"I met Jim Moriarty for the first time last night," Sherlock said, almost calmly, and suddenly Greg felt like hugging him, rather than throttling him. Because if they had a description, something to go on, they had some hope.

"So what you got?"

"Nothing. The man doesn't exist officially. Well, you'd hardly expect a criminal mastermind to have a Facebook page, would you?"

"You must have _something_ ," Greg insisted, "Some way we can get hold of him."

"I can't do it and the Met certainly can't," Sherlock said. "But I know a man who can." His face was still calm, but there was something acid in his tone now, and Greg belatedly realised who he meant.

"You're leaving _Mycroft_ to deal with this?"

"He has the resources to find the man wherever in the world he goes. I don't."

"You're giving up on the case?"

"I'm delegating," Sherlock said. His face hardened into the merciless expression that Greg knew too well. The one that meant: _Back off now or you'll regret it._ It was tempting to try and push further, to tell Sherlock that he _couldn't_ give up, but he didn't dare to. That was what it always came down to in the end. If Sherlock wanted to stop helping the Met, he could do so right this minute. And if he did that – if he did that because Greg pissed him off – people would die as a result. He wouldn't be able to forget that, even if Sherlock could. He was desperate for Sherlock. He always would be.

"If you or your brother find anything useful, let me know," he said, and turned and walked away down Baker Street.

***

That afternoon he read John's blog post. Well, more read between the lines. Moriarty had defeated Sherlock and Sherlock had run for cover. But he still needed Sherlock; one failure wasn't the end of the world.

Officially, they were still trying to track down James Moriarty, suspected of murder, terrorist offences and conspiracy to defraud. Unofficially, the Scotland Yard rumour mill was hard at work. MI5 were taking over the case; Moriarty had fled to Ireland; he was some kind of decoy. Greg wasn't surprised when DCS Hamilton appeared on their floor later and stood most of the teams down. The case was no longer a priority. They'd given up, in other words, just like Sherlock had.

It was time to go home. He texted Ruth to say he'd be home by six, and then sent a second message:   _Do you want me to pick anything up at the supermarket?_ Trying to show things were back to normal, that he wasn't a crap husband, that he cared.

***

"The kids are off at Jenny's," Ruth told him, as Greg unpacked the milk and tomatoes and peanut butter she'd requested. He'd bought a bottle of rosé as well, hoping they could share it that evening. "I wanted to talk to you on our own."

He stuck the wine in the fridge and looked at her. Her long hair was tied firmly back in a plait; there were black rings around her hazel eyes. She'd been busy coping with the kids and they were both tired. Not a good time to talk, but better not to let things fester.

"I'm sorry," he said. "It was a big case, and I'm not allowed to tell you much about it, even now. It involved bombings, you see."

"But it's over?"

"We didn't get the man. We're not going to." There was a point when it made sense to give up. It didn't mean you had to like it.

Ruth nodded, and then said. "Sorry about that." There was a long pause and she stared down at her hands, as if there were notes on them she wanted to check. Without looking up, she said:

"I think we should have a trial separation." Her voice was calm but hard, and he gaped at her, and wondered for a moment if he'd misheard.

"I've been working things out," she added hastily. "The kids and I would stay at Jenny's, just for a few weeks, while we find a flat somewhere, nearer to Rob's school. Shared custody, of course; we can fit it round your shifts, I'm used to doing that..."

Ruth rattled on about the logistics, all carefully considered and Greg wondered how long she'd been planning this. And whether he ought to do something but sit and stare and listen to his life unravelling. Ruth seemed to have all the answers and he wasn't even sure what the question was yet.

***

He remembered asking _why?_ at some point later in the evening. He was still sitting at the kitchen table and there was a glass of rosé in front of him, and his wife was leaving him.

"It's not working," Ruth said. She wasn't crying; Ruth didn't cry. But her voice sounded an inch away from screaming. "You know it isn't. With a separation...maybe we can sort this out. Work out what we really want."

"I don't want this," Greg replied, and then closed his eyes, trying to think, not just react. Least worst options here, as usual. Saying "No" didn't help, whether to a two-year-old or a chief superintendent. However hard it was, he had to try and co-operate.

"It doesn't make sense all four of you moving out," he said at last, and now he had something concrete to say it was easier. "Suppose _I_ go and stay somewhere for a few weeks, and we see how we feel then, when the dust has settled?"

"Thank you." Ruth's voice was barely a whisper. "I'm sorry, Greg, I just...I just need to work out what to do next."

Her face was miserable and he longed to hug her, make it better somehow. But how did you make things better if you were apparently the problem to start with?

"I'll go and pack," he said, draining his wine glass. "Probably stay at a hotel overnight, don't want to impose on Stan any more."

"The newsagents up the road have got adverts for rooms to rent," Ruth said awkwardly. "It's not...I'm not saying forever. Just for now."

_Beg and it will make things worse. Yell and it will make things worse. Throw things and it will make it impossibly worse._ He had to get out now, before the numbness wore off. He was an adult and he had to behave like one.

He lay in a cramped hotel bed that night, replaying conversations with Ruth in his head. But no matter what he said, there was never one that ended well.

***     

He told Sally a couple of days later, knowing she'd pass it onto the rest of the team.

"I don't want to talk about it," he said. "But just so you know."

"You know what I think?" Sally said belligerently, and he could practically hear "bitch" hovering on her lips. An echo of his own angry impulse to cut Ruth down to size. To stoke the hostility that would turn a trial separation into a permanent gulf.

"Don't wanna hear," he said, and Sally nodded and replied:

"Whatever you want, sir."

She'd tell the others he was too soft, he was sure of it, that Ruth was completely in the wrong. But the thing was, it didn't matter, did it? Results, not intentions, that was what counted in real life. Better swallow his pride and co-operate with Ruth than bring the whole house of cards down just so he could sit in a self-righteous heap. Someone had to act like a grown-up.

***    

Sally's extensive network of relatives produced a flat for rent in a moderately dodgy part of Deptford. The kids took the separation better than he'd expected. Better than he'd hoped, maybe. Had he wanted them to say: _this is all wrong, this mustn't happen?_ But even wrong things, impossible things came to seem normal in time, what you'd expect. Ordinary people shuddered when they so much as thought about dead bodies; he saw corpses every week. He'd get used to not being married at some point; he didn't want to, but he knew it would happen.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Greg gets a lungful of some weird gas during the Baskerville case it's not surprising that things get out of control...

It had been asking for trouble for Greg to say he was enjoying himself at The Cross Keys; one of those rash statements that just encouraged Fate to come and knee him in the groin. But it was true all the same. It was a hell of a lot better than sitting on his own on a beach on the Costa del Sol. He'd gone for something cheap at the last minute. Ten days in Marbella, to distract him from the fact that he wasn't on a camp site in Norfolk with his family, where he had should have been. But his hotel was full of families: Emily look-alikes, an overheard argument that was Ruth and Rob to a T, a silly sign that Katy would have loved. He photographed it and e-mailed it to her anyway, but it wasn't the same.

It wouldn't have been hard for Mycroft to find him, but had he realised how easy it would be to persuade Greg to go to Devon? A mysterious case, the prospect of being with friends again – he's count John as a friend, now, at least – how could he resist? He'd made token complaints about his holiday being spoiled, but he'd given in embarrassingly easily. Mycroft had probably expected that; but not even Mycroft Holmes could have expected what would happen down in Devon.

***

It seemed obvious enough to Greg what was going on, once he'd talked to the couple running The Cross Keys. _Their_ dog might be dead, but someone else had had the same bright idea of a publicity stunt. Only this time, they'd nicked an animal from Baskerville. It'd doubtless turn out to have rabies, he thought, or three heads. Still, Sherlock would work out what it was and how to catch it. Once he'd done that and Greg had explained to the local police that they couldn't charge Sherlock with anything, they could all have a cream tea and head home.

Even when Sherlock told him to bring his gun along to Dewar's Hollow, Greg presumed it was just to warn people off. Mycroft might have had him armed, but both the Holmeses knew that Greg wasn't an expert shot. He hadn't realised he was going to be expected to shoot monsters. Well, maybe Sherlock hadn't wanted him to do that, but _someone_ yelled at him to kill the dog, and he'd tried to. And if that wasn't what he was supposed to do, then why the hell hadn't somebody explained to him what was going on? And fuck it, some guy they were chasing then got himself blown up, but that was just bloody Dartmoor for you, clearly. If the poison gas didn't get you, the minefields did. He wanted to be back home in nice, safe London.

***

By the time the patrol car turned up, Sherlock and John and Henry had all buggered off, and he was leaning against a tree trying to work out if it was safe to move. He showed the constables his warrant card and the gun permit – thank God Sherlock hadn't pinched those – and they took him along to Oakhampton nick. There they gave him hot, sweet tea and shone a light in his eyes and eventually decided he wasn't concussed or drunk, just a bit muddled.

"Come back tomorrow and give us a statement," the duty sergeant said soothingly. "You might make a bit more sense after a night's sleep. Not like it's gonna make any difference, mind you. We're not allowed to touch the Baskerville lot, it's MOD police only up there."

"OK," Greg said. "See you tomorrow." He stood up and told himself he could work out how to get back to the inn if he really concentrated.

"Where you staying, then?" the sergeant asked.

"Cross Keys."

"Oh, them mad buggers with the vegetables. Andy can give you a lift back there, you shouldn't be driving in your state. Hope your friends didn't crash into anything."

***

When they dropped Greg off at the inn, he hurried off to find Sherlock and John's room. He banged on the door for a bit and Sherlock emerged in grey pyjamas.

"Lestrade?" Sherlock asked, leaning on the door and looking slightly bewildered.

"You OK?" Greg demanded, and his hand went out to grab Sherlock's bicep, make sure it was really him. "The fog, it does something to you, it screws up your brain."

"Yes, I know. An aerosol hallucinogenic. We all inhaled it, but it'll be excreted from our systems soon."

"Are you sure you're OK? I came down here to look after you. I can't go back to bloody Mycroft and say I let you lose your mind."

"Lestrade, I'm fine. Go to bed."

His weary brain couldn't work out why Sherlock didn't understand that there was something wrong. He knew it now. There was something wrong with Sherlock, but he couldn't work out what.

"I need to make sure you're OK," he said.

Sherlock's brow was creasing now, as if he'd finally realised that there something odd.

"Oh, I see," he said, slowly. "I suppose I should have foreseen this. All right, but I don't want John disturbed. Where's your room?"

"Number five, upstairs, at the end of the corridor," he said. Sherlock was unpeeling Greg's fingers from where they were curled round his arm.

"Don't do that," Greg protested. "I might lose you."

"Take my hand," Sherlock said, and there was an unusual note of patience in his voice. "Follow me, we're going to find your room."

He wasn't sure what was going on any more, but Sherlock seemed to know, so he followed him. And there was nothing scary in his room, which was good.

"Sit down on the bed," Sherlock said, and Greg did what he was told. Sherlock was looking down at him now, reading his mind, the way he always could.

"You've been drugged," Sherlock said. "You know that." Greg nodded. "And you know that the drug creates extreme suggestibility and fear." Greg nodded again. "There was a dog, but it was an ordinary dog. Not some mutant freak."

"I know. I'm not...I'm not seeing things."

"No," Sherlock said, "but you're still in an emotionally heightened state. The drug exacerbates hidden fears: Henry's feelings of inadequacy, my own worries about my mind rotting. John..." He paused, and when he spoke again, there was an odd roughness about his voice. "John is exceptionally brave when he can fight back. When the dog attacked, he had a gun in his hand and he was steady as a rock. But put him in a position where he can't fight, and he feels as vulnerable as the rest of us."

"Is John OK?" Greg asked. He'd always reckoned that if John could cope with Sherlock, he could cope with _anything_.

"That's the first time you've asked about him," Sherlock said softly, and then he strode across the room to stand by the bed, and his hand reached down to rest on Greg's chin, tilt up his head, so his eyes met Sherlock's. "Revealing, isn't it, of your priorities? It's me you worry about, it's me you want to protect."

"I don't..." he said, and he didn't know what else to say, because his thoughts were jumbling together. Sherlock's cool fingers on him, Sherlock's eyes gazing into his. This wasn't what was supposed to happen, was it? Or was this what he'd dreamt about, had nightmares about? He started to get up from the bed. He had to explain to Sherlock, he had to tell him the truth, except he wasn't sure what the truth was...

"Sherlock," he breathed, "I mean, what I want is–"

"–What you want is _me_ ," Sherlock said abruptly, and his hand pulled back from Greg as if he was on fire. Sherlock's breathing was too fast, as well, as if he was the one who'd seen something alarming. "The drug just reveals impulses that are already there. But you have to realise, _Greg_ , that friendship's not on offer. No room at the inn; no heart in me."

"That's not true," he protested. There were tears on his cheeks. Maybe the fog was making him cry. Because if there was fog it would explain why he couldn't see Sherlock clearly. "I've seen–"

"You've seen things that aren't there," Sherlock said, "and it's time to stop. Your mind's full of chaos, and you're liable to wreck everything. We have to work together, Lestrade, we are colleagues and nothing more. So you lie down, and sleep, and in the morning, the mists will have gone from your mind."

"I can't...how can I sleep?" he asked. He looked up at Sherlock and he watched a patient smile appear on Sherlock's face, Sherlock becoming, just for an instant, a good man.

"Lie down and wait," Sherlock said, and there was a warmth in his voice Greg didn't often hear. "If I need you, I'll text you and you must be sure to come at once. There are still dangerous men out there. I'm the bait for them; I'm relying on you to spring the trap. But you mustn't come back to my room, or you'll scare them off." He walked out, closing the door behind him.

Greg sat on the bed. He couldn't remember now who the men were that they were after. He was so tired, but he wouldn't let Sherlock down, not when he'd asked for his help. He'd just close his eyes for a moment, because maybe then his head wouldn't ache so much...

*** 

He couldn't find Sherlock in the fog of the hollow – he reached out for a figure in a long black coat and it turned to fog itself, dissolving in his fingers.

"Sherlock?" he croaked, and there Sherlock was at last, his hand reaching out to Greg's cheek as if to check _he_ was real. Greg's arms went round the man's thin body and his mouth fastened on Sherlock's warm, full lips, because if they stayed together the fog couldn't get them. But when Greg's hand went up to brush the black curls, what he felt was the coarse fur of a huge dog, and Sherlock's mouth broke away from his, widened into a snarl...

Greg woke up shuddering at that point, and decided that going back to sleep ever again was probably a bad move. Besides it was half-seven, time to get up. He went into the bathroom for a shower, washing away the sweat of last night, before he shaved. Christ, he thought, seeing himself in the mirror, he still looked rough, didn't he? And why the hell had he dreamt that stuff?  Not surprising he was still having nightmares about the dog, but how had his imagination come up with kissing Sherlock? Why could he still feel Sherlock's touch on his skin?

 _Oh fuck_. That had happened, hadn't it? Not all of it had been a dream. Sherlock's hand on his face, just for a moment. You saw a dog and imagined a monster. You felt a touch and imagined... what?

He shook his head. He needed breakfast, he needed fresh air, he needed someone normal to talk to. He'd go downstairs and the world would be the same as yesterday, and he'd be fine. He dressed hurriedly, trying to ignore the knot of worry in his stomach. The dog would be a dog today – a dead one, but that wasn't his fault – and the moor would be beautiful, and there was nothing to worry about.

And then he opened the curtains and realised that there was something. Sherlock in his fancy coat was walking out to the outside tables carrying a couple of mugs, and Greg just stood there and watched the arrogant sweep of his body. Sherlock handed one of the mugs to someone in a purple shirt – it must be John, he realised – and then they sat and had their drinks and talked, and Greg couldn't take his eyes off Sherlock. The crease in his brows – were John and him having an argument?  Followed by an unexpected grin that told you that Sherlock wasn't just a thinking machine after all. Flesh and blood there, Greg thought, wishing that _he_ could bring that grin to Sherlock's face. That Sherlock would right now walk into The Cross Keys and up the stairs and knock on the door of his room. And when Greg opened the door, those grey eyes would look into his and they'd smile at each other, because they both knew what they wanted at last...

God, he was going insane, wasn't he? He was imagining...he was fantasising about Sherlock. What had the bloody drug done to him? He tried to remember what Sherlock had said last night to Henry. Something about _fear and stimulus_ , _what our drugged minds wanted us to see_. You imagine what you fear, but maybe also sometimes what you want. Sherlock. Sherlock undressing him, using him, consuming him. Their bodies fusing together till the pain in their heads stopped for once...

He turned away from the window, closed his eyes and stood still. Tried to breathe, to think, because the gas wasn't there now, was it? No excuse for confusion. Start from the facts. Gregory Simon Lestrade, police officer aged 48, recently separated from his wife. Clearly having some kind of mid-life crisis as a result, so subconsciously falls for someone unobtainable – most beautiful bloke of his acquaintance. Even though he always reckoned he was straight. Then he gets a lungful of some weird gas and starts fantasizing that this is actually going to happen.

He'd had cases like that. Well, not exactly like that, but people who'd been through messy break-ups did sometimes do ridiculous things, especially if drugs were involved. He had to come to his senses before someone got hurt.

Too late for that, wasn't it? Sherlock must have realised what was happening last night. Though Sherlock had been behaving weirdly himself– strung out on the fog, as well, no doubt. Best for them both to pretend nothing had happened, delete it from their memories. But he couldn't face Sherlock just yet, not until he was sure he'd got _it_ – whatever it was – out of his system.

He counted to ten, opened his eyes. He still had a job to do, clearing up this mess. He needed to go back up to Okehampton and reassure the local force this wasn't the start of a major crime wave.  But the first thing he had to do was talk to Mycroft, who was doubtlessly going to be royally pissed off about last night's events.

***

Mycroft was unavailable, so Greg told the whole story to Anthea, who managed to sound unimpressed even by deadly minefields and night attacks by giant dogs. She cheerfully forbade him to tell the Devon and Cornwall police anything, but he didn't pay much attention. Much better to have the boys on the ground know what was happening, rather than just letting them hear the rumours. And sure enough, when he got to the police station, one of the constables was already dealing with a member of the public insisting that there were killer werewolves on the moor, and surely that should be more of a policing priority than speeding in South Zeal? Greg wondered if he should ask if the werewolf in human form was tall and dark and beautiful and wore the collar of his coat up. He wasn't the only one haunted by Sherlock, was he?

It took until the end of the afternoon to get everything sorted with the police and the MoD, including ensuring Mycroft's lot would pay for decontaminating Dewar's Hollow. Greg headed back to Grimpen, but it seemed to have been invaded by even more hound-hunting tourists.  He couldn't face that, he decided, he needed to get away. Go somewhere where he could forget all this, forget Sherlock. Otherwise he'd end up sitting in his room all evening, remembering last night. Wishing that he'd told Sherlock how much he meant to him. Or just grabbed the man and found out what was underneath that fancy coat...

Oh, god. Maybe the problem was that he was sex-starved. Three months separated from Ruth and he'd not thought of looking for someone else. And now he was going haywire, fantasising about some _bloke_. What he needed, he decided, was a night out. Remind himself how things worked. He might even get lucky, he supposed, and get to remember how _everything_ worked.

Grimpen was hardly a good place to pull, though. Besides, the moor was starting to give him the creeps again; his body tensed every time he heard a noise, straining to hear a distant howl. Get out of the place for the moment, he thought. He headed downstairs and one of the owners promptly came up to him: the big Scottish one. Gary, wasn't it?

"You OK, sir? Anything we can do for you?" The man was obviously still worried that he was going to get it in the neck for the stunt with the dog.

"I'm fine," Greg replied promptly, and then remembered. "Well, actually there is something. If I was looking for some nightlife, where's the best place to go?"

"If it's bars or clubs you're after," Gary replied more happily, "then Plymouth's your best bet. There's a big club called Oceana up at the Barbican, or there's lots of places down Union Street. Though down there can get a wee bit rough at times, so you need to mind yourself. Was there anything particular you were looking for?"

 _Some woman I can make out with and forget about Ruth and...everyone else._ _But I can hardly say that._ "Just...maybe somewhere not too busy, where I could meet someone," he said awkwardly.

Gary smiled reassuringly. "Try The Salty Dog at the top of Union Street. They're a friendly bunch there, they'll look after you."

"Thanks," he said and went down to his car, thinking that if he was having a mid-life crisis, Plymouth was probably not a bad place to have it.

***

One look at Oceana and Greg decided he was thirty years too old for it. What was the other place Gary had suggested? Somewhere on Union Street? He soon got lost, as he walked past half of Plymouth out on a spree. By the time he got to Union Street and found The Salty Dog, he was happy just to hurry in – they didn't seem to worry about dress codes, thank God – and grab a seat at the bar.

Wasn't bad music, he thought after a bit; eighties disco, and it wasn't just kids on the floor, either; some older blokes. Mostly blokes here, in fact, and then it finally dawned on him. Gary had presumed he was looking for a gay club, hadn't he? Well, no he wasn't, but his feet still hurt, so he was going to sit here and finish his drink and then leave. Coz he wasn't embarrassed about this at all.

He found himself watching one of the dancers, a floppy-haired teenager who seemed oblivious to everyone else. He looked _poor_ , somehow: the pinched face that came from not quite enough food, clothes that looked worn rather than deliberately shabby. Greg remembered abruptly what it was like when you couldn't afford what the rest of your friends took for granted. The kid wasn't even a particularly good dancer, but he had a smile on his face now like he was the star of his own personal movie, and Greg suddenly, ridiculously, envied him. That feeling that anything was possible – when had he lost that, why couldn't _he_ just enjoy himself for once?

Out of the corner of his eye he saw someone sit down beside him, and then a soft Devon accent said: "He's eighteen. No underage drinking or sex here."

 Greg looked round to see a brown-haired man in a tight blue T-shirt looking at him warily. He was sure he'd seen him somewhere before, but where? The man's grey eyes stared into Greg's defiantly, as he went on: "Anyhow, ain't you got enough poofs in London to persecute, Inspector, without coming down here?"

How did he know he was a police officer? And then his brain caught up. It was the man who ran the tours at Grimpen, wasn't it?

"I'm not on duty," he told him hurriedly.

The man blinked and then smiled.

"Oh, I see," he said, "That's OK then." He held out his hand and Greg shook it. "I'm Fletch Robinson. Well, it's Alec, really. Alec Fletcher Robinson."

"Greg Lestrade."

Alec's smile broadened into a grin. "I thought you were here to cause trouble, see. I forgot they let poofs into the police in London."

Greg opened his mouth to say: _I'm not gay_ and then shut it again, because frankly he wasn't sure what was going on anymore. Fortunately, Alec didn't seem to mind doing the talking.

"What you looking for?" he asked. "I can tell you about most of the lads in here. So if there is anyone you like the look of, like young Charlie over there..."

"I'm not–" Greg began and stopped. Because if he said: _I'm not interested,_ what the hell was he doing here? He should walk out of The Salty Dog right this minute...

And do what? Go back to The Cross Keys and mope about Ruth and Sherlock? Wander round Plymouth staring at the sea and wish that his life hadn't turned out like this? He didn't want to be alone tonight and he was near the stage of not caring who he shared a bed with. God, he was a mess.

Alec had fallen silent, staring at him, as if wondering what he was playing at. And then he said with a sudden smile: "You haven't done this before, have you? Gone to a bar, picked up a bloke?"

Greg shook his head, feeling like the world's oldest teenager. But there was something oddly kind about Alec's smile now, as he reached out and placed a hand on Greg's thigh.

"You could come back to my place," he said softly. "I'll look after you. Give you a good time, I will. You want someone who knows what they're doing."

Alec's hand felt warm, solid. He seemed to know what he wanted, even if Greg didn't. Why not just let this happen?

"OK," he said, "My car's parked down near the Hoe." He swigged down the last of his drink and followed Alec out of the bar.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What should Greg do when he's out of the fogs of Devon?

Alec's flat in Mutton Cove was cramped, but neat, full of photos of Dartmoor in all seasons.

"I'm a bit of a photographer," he said. "Like to make my living like that, but there's too much competition. Bedroom through there."

There was barely space in the bedroom for the double bed. Greg stood there awkwardly, still wondering if perhaps he should go.

"Don't worry," Alec said, pulling his T-shirt over his head. "It'll be OK. It's always hard, when you're not sure what you want. But you'll like it, I promise you." He came over and kissed Greg, very gently on the lips. Greg shut his eyes and kissed him back. Maybe he should just stop thinking...

"Why don't you lie down, make yourself comfortable?" Alec whispered. "I can turn the light off if you like."

"Yes," Greg croaked. In the dark they could be anybody. In the dark, far away from Scotland Yard, from Ruth, from Sherlock bloody Holmes, what did it matter what he did? Alec moved to flick the light switch, as Greg took off his shoes and socks and then fumbled with the zip on his trousers.

"Need help?" Alec's voice whispered in his ear, and Greg was promptly distracted by fingers expertly undoing his shirt-buttons, easing the fabric off his body, before a tongue trailed briefly across his right nipple. The touch sent a spark though his nerves, and now there was a hand reaching into his Y-fronts, rubbing gently against his swelling prick. He probably should lie down before his legs gave way, he thought, half stumbling as he pulled his trousers off. The bed creaked beneath him, and strong hands were stripping off his underpants now, before unerringly finding his nipples again. And then the liquid warmth of a mouth closed gently around the tip of his erection.

God, Alec was good at this, he thought, letting out a strangled breath. Or maybe it had just been so long since he'd had this, someone enjoying themself playing with his body. Alec's mouth was now using slow, teasing licks that were making him gasp and thrust upwards...

Damn near making him come, as well, he thought, gulping out "Stop". Because if he was doing this, he'd rather it wasn't over in five minutes flat. He wanted someone to stay with, to hold onto.

"You having fun yet?" Alec asked, a little breathlessly, and Greg could imagine the smile on his face. "Or you still not sure yet whether you like this? Coz I did have a few more ideas, if you'll let me show you. Seems a shame to waste a nice big cock like that on my mouth. Hold on a minute, while I find some supplies."

Greg lay there in the dark, heart pounding. He had to trust Alec. He could hear him moving around for some time, and then fingers were brushing over his belly.

"Condom and lots of lube," Alec announced, "that's what you need for this. I'm clean, mind you, but just so as you don't worry."

 His fingers were skilfully rolling the condom onto Greg as he spoke; Greg wondered for a moment if he could see in the dark. To him, Alec was just a shadowy blur in the room. But for his voice, he could be anyone. They both could be. Now Alec's hand was slicking lube on his erection, raising Greg's excitement again. He squeezed his nails into his palms, worrying he might come before Alec was ready for him. Then he heard Alec chuckle, felt his warm breath on his chest as the man straddled his body.

"Once you know what you're doing, it's all quite easy. You just gotta learn how to relax," Alec said. He lowered himself and Greg felt his prick slowly being enveloped, burying snugly into the other man. Just mind-blowing – the feel, the connection– and he was lost, thrusting up, groaning, as Alec rocked his pelvis convulsively. The world narrowing down to sweat and friction, dissolving into sensation, as Greg's eyes squeezed shut. Lips on his, kissing and panting, and he was muttering nonsense back, – good, so fucking good – and he could feel the pressure building, till there was no way back. He came and there was blissful nothingness for a few moments, as he lay stunned. Alec was still on him, groaning loudly, and he wasn't sure what to do, how to help, but then he felt him come, clenching round his own softening cock, splattering his chest. Greg was a sticky, worn out, happy mess, content just to lie here for the rest of his life.

It took him a while to register when Alec put the light back on and offered him tissues.

"You OK?" Alec asked. "You haven't got a dodgy heart or anything, have you?"

"I'm fine," Greg said, trying to open his eyes and finding it was an effort to. "It was...good."

"Told you you needed the right person," Alec said smugly. "Wanna stay for the night? You look a bit beat to be driving."

He was warm and he was safe; the dream Hound wouldn't come sniffing round a flat in Plymouth.

"Thanks," he said. "Be good." He thought that Alec bent down and kissed him again then, but maybe he was already dreaming at that point.

***

Greg woke up feeling groggy and trying to work out why the furniture in the Cross Keys bedroom had rearranged itself overnight. _I'm losing it, aren't I? I'm not in Grimpen any more. Last night_... His brain was still trying to process _last night_ , and then the shower that had been going in the background stopped and Alec appeared in the doorway in a faded blue bathrobe. His damp hair was sticking up and he had his normal grin on. _Shit, last night I slept with someone who's cheerful in the morning_.

"Any chance of a coffee?" Greg muttered.

"Sure," Alec said. "Like a bacon sarnie as well? You won't get that at The Cross Keys."

"That'd be wonderful." 

Alec's grin broadened. "Shower's hot if you want one," he said, and watched with unashamed pleasure as Greg dragged his weary, naked body off to the bathroom. Alec must have a thing for the elderly, Greg decided. He felt about eighty that morning. Though the shower helped and so did the smell of coffee and a fry-up as he got dressed. He sat in the tiny, dark kitchen, gulped down his first cup and felt vaguely human again.

"How much longer you in Grimpen?" Alec asked, as he handed him his sandwich.

"I should probably head home today," Greg replied, and "home" felt a bit odd suddenly. A flat barely bigger than this one, and far less welcoming.

"So what's gonna happen about Gary and Billy?" There was a trace of tension in Alec's voice now, even as he tried to sound casual, and several things abruptly fell into place in Greg's mind. _Of all the gin joints in all the towns in the world, he had to walk into this one._ When he looked up, frowning, Alec gave him a disarming grin.

"Us poofs gotta stick together," he said. "Especially down here. Gary said you might be going to the Salty Dog, so I thought I'd drop in, see what you were after."

Greg couldn't resist smiling back. "If you're seducing someone for information, it's best to leave the sex till _after_ the person tells you what you want to know."

"I fancied you anyhow," Alec said simply. "Right from when I first saw you."

It was oddly morale-boosting, Greg thought.

"So are they gonna get into trouble? About the dog, I mean?" Alec went on.

"Did you know about that?"

"I told them not to buy it, but when Gary gets an idea into his head, you just can't stop him."

"They nearly drove Henry Knight mad, and they got Frankland _and_ the dog killed."

"The _dog's_ dead?"

"It got shot," Greg said. There was a look momentarily on Alec's face that reminded him of Katy when her last hamster had died, and he added hastily, "But it wasn't me who did it."

"So what happened last night? I heard there was nothing much left of Frankland," Alec said, trying unconvincingly to sound like a man who couldn't care less about dead dogs _or_ dead men. He sat down opposite Greg. Their knees almost touched under the kitchen table, and Greg could sense that Alec's legs were shaky. Your first few corpses were always the worst.

"According to the MoD, Dr Frankland had been on the moor trying to catch the dog, panicked when something went wrong and ran into the minefield by mistake."

"He wouldn't have done that," Alec protested. "What really happened?"

"You know I'm not allowed to tell you."

"I can keep a secret, promise. Frankland was up to no good, wasn't he?"

"What makes you think that?" Greg demanded. Alec smiled, regaining some of his normal confidence.

"He was working at a top-secret defence place and he was always wandering round chatting to people. Everyone else at Baskerville keeps themselves to themselves. Of course he was up to _something_."

Trust someone on the spot to notice something odd, Greg thought. If only they'd thought to interview Alec.

"I can't discuss what he was doing," he said, and he couldn't keep the edge of anger out of his voice. Frankland had murdered a man in front of his seven-year-old son. What kind of bastard would do a thing like that?

"He was to blame for Mr Knight's death, wasn't he? Henry's dad." Alec said quietly. "I know about Henry. He was in my primary school."

Not just Henry, but a whole community traumatised. That was why you had to catch killers, so people could feel safe again. But had the original investigation missed something? Could they have stopped Frankland earlier?

"What makes you think Frankland had anything to do with that?" Greg asked.

"Coz he's always hanging round Dewar's Hollow, and no-one else does. That's where Henry's dad was killed. Frankland did something to the Hollow that drove the dog mad. That's why it killed Mr Knight."

Greg knew he looked blank, as Alec leant forward and added earnestly, "There's something _wrong_ with Dewar's Hollow. I saw a man there once, a man who wasn't there. And when I kissed him, he stabbed me. Least it felt like he had, but when I got out of the fog, there was nothing: no man and no blood. I didn't know if it was magic or what."  
"It's a drug," Greg replied, without thinking. "Frankland laced the fog there with some chemical that makes you imagine things." He could feel his stomach knot even now. The dog. The dog and Sherlock. Alec's hand reached out, rested on Greg's arm.

"You're OK," he said. "We're nowhere near the moor, fog can't get you here. But you don't know what you're doing when you've had it, do you?"

Greg shook his head.

"Be the same for a dog," Alec went on. "They were breeding huge dogs up at Baskerville, my mate told me that. Only just because a dog's big, doesn't mean it's vicious. But if you put one in the fog at Dewar's Hollow and it was scared coz it didn't know what was happening, it'd turn nasty, wouldn't it? I reckon Frankland took one of the Baskerville dogs up there to try his experiment out and it went mad and ran away and killed Mr Knight."

It made almost as much sense as the true story, Greg thought. Well, what Mycroft had told him was the true story.

"You think there really _is_ a huge dog on the moor?" he asked, and, Alec smiled again.

"Not any more," he said confidently. "That was twenty years ago. A big dog wouldn't live more than ten years, maybe less. That's why Gary thought we needed a new one." He paused, and looked hopefully at Greg, and added:

"I'm sorry about Henry, really I am. We didn't mean no harm, but the tourists always want to hear more stuff about the Hound."

"And you give them what they want?" Alec was obviously good at that, Greg thought.  
   
"They like being scared, you see. I did an ordinary tour of Dartmoor for a bit, but the tourists always wanted to hear about escaped prisoners, and bogs that can swallow up a man alive. It's fun, hearing about stuff like that. I bet when you tell people you're a detective at parties, they want to hear all about gruesome murders."

Greg nodded. Yet another reason he didn't have a social life. Alec's fingers were stroking the back of Greg's left hand now, and a serious look had come over his normally cheerful face. And then he asked, far too casually:

"So are you allowed to tell your wife about your cases?"

Greg looked down automatically, but his wedding ring wasn't there. You couldn't really see any more that there ever had been one.

"Who says I'm married?" he demanded, and his voice sounded harsh to his own ears.

Alec smiled again, and took his hand away. "You look the way you do and you're supposed to be straight. Of course you're married. Don't worry, I told you I can keep a secret."

"My wife's left me." It burst out without him thinking, and his head slumped forward. What the hell did he think he was doing?

"That's rough, Greg. Been married long?" There was nothing but friendly concern in Alec's voice.

"Nearly fifteen years. Three kids."

"Make sure you stay in touch with them. My dad buggered off when I was twelve and I never seen him again."

When Greg looked up, Alec's smile was rueful now. As if he'd given away too much as well. He looked at his watch.

"My first tour's at eleven," he said. "So I need to be over at Grimpen by ten. If you follow me, I can show you the best route there." He smiled again, and stood up. "Sorry if your sarnie's got a bit cold. I could put it in the microwave."

"It's OK," Greg said, as he finished it up hastily.

"I won't tell anyone," Alec said hastily. "Not even Billy and Gary. I'll just say I spotted you in a bar and reckoned you were too drunk to drive home safely, so I gave you a bed for the night."

He was a professional teller of stories, of course, Greg thought.  "I probably look rough enough."

"You'll be fine. You just gotta get your head right." Alec went over to a drawer, pulled something out.

"My business card," he said, putting it beside Greg's plate. "If you're ever down this way again, I'll give you special rates on the tour. And it's got my mobile on so, you know, if you want to talk..."

"Thanks," Greg said and waited awkwardly for Alec to ask for _his_ number. Then he saw Alec's smile and realised that he was leaving it up to Greg what happened next.

For a moment he wondered about staying on at The Cross Keys. He could have a day or two more there, surely? A night or two more. And Gary and Billy would hardly kick up a fuss about _Alec_. But no, it was ridiculous. There would doubtless be loads of paperwork about Frankland, even if officially it wasn't his case. And Mycroft would want more reports and his gun back. And his family were back from Norfolk today, and...and he couldn't stay. It was simple as that.

"Thanks for looking after me last night," he said, and Alec replied, smiling:

"Couldn't let a big-shot inspector like you get done for drink-driving, could I? If we go in about five minutes, is that OK?"

***

The last glimpse Greg had of Alec was him getting out of his rusting white Fiat at The Cross Keys. Alec waved at him in his car, and then walked off to talk to one of the waitresses, clearing up the table outside. Greg wondered if the cheeky smile on Alec's face was for him or her. But it didn't matter anyhow. What mattered was sorting things out and getting back to London.

***

Greg only realised when he was unpacking in Deptford that his phone was switched off. He'd turned it off last night, he remembered, when he'd left the bar with Alec. On his voicemail there were three increasingly worried calls from Ruth. Please could he call her back, let her know if he was OK.

"What's up?" he asked when he phoned.

"I...could I come round, please?" she asked.

***

His flat was messy, of course, but having clutter around helped conceal a bit just how unappealing it was; cheap furniture and cheaper construction. Greg could see Ruth bite her lip as she came inside; it was the first time she'd seen the place properly.

"You've settled in?" she said, and he recognised the delaying tactic, and wondered what it was she didn't feel able to say yet.

"Coffee?" he asked, and when she accepted he made them both some, and then sat down on the sagging brown sofa and waited silently. The way he did with witnesses, sometimes, till they'd tell him things just to break the silence. Ruth sat down, very tentatively, on the other end of the sofa, six inches of space between them.

"I thought you were on holiday in Spain," she said, "but then I heard on the news at lunchtime that a man had been blown up on Dartmoor near a top-secret army base. And when I phoned up the Yard, they said you were down in Devon."

"Why did you think it had anything to do with me?" Greg demanded.

Ruth clutched at her mug. "One of the news reports mentioned Sherlock Holmes. So I thought you might be down there as well."

"I was," he said. No point in lying, she'd find out eventually. He watched her force herself not to panic, to fear for his life retrospectively. And then waited for her anger: Sherlock again, putting him in harm's way. But Ruth just sat there, drinking her coffee and not saying anything, and it was Greg who ended up breaking the silence.

"The man who died was a murderer," he said. "He was trying to escape arrest, and he took a short-cut through a minefield."

"And you're OK?"

"I'm fine." He could hardly tell Ruth about the hallucinogenic fog. That he was possibly in love with Sherlock. That he'd had a one night stand with a man he'd met in a Plymouth bar.

"Please be careful," Ruth said, and her hand reached out to clasp onto his.

"I always am," he lied, as he thought about firing bullets at a phantom hound and the flash as the mine went off. You couldn't be careful with Sherlock around. Contradiction in terms. Ruth's hand, warm and solid, held onto his and he tried not to think about the last time someone had held his hand. Her hair was loose, the way she had it when she didn't have to worry about being tidy and organised and practical. She looked younger with it like that, the girl he remembered meeting almost twenty years ago.

"How was your holiday?" he asked.

"Katy moaned about earwigs in the tent, but Emily and Rob had a wonderful time. Emily's decided she's going to be an underwater vet. I think she means treating injured dolphins." Ruth paused and then went on, suddenly speeding up. "I, I, it didn't seem right. Without you there." She pulled her hand back almost fiercely from Greg and started to run it through her hair. "Greg?"

"Yes?"

"Do you...I'm not sure...do you think this separation is working? Is it the right thing to do?"

Ruth always had her own opinion; she was never unsure about anything. Greg looked at her, his thoughts whirling.

"Are you saying...?" he began, and wasn't sure he dared go on.

"I'm asking whether you'd be willing to have another go." Ruth turned to face him. "I said it was a trial separation. Or is it...is it too late?" There was something near terror in her hazel eyes.

Greg's hand went out automatically to squeeze her shoulder, even as his brain tried to process the information. Ruth coming back. Sherlock's hand on his face. Emily and Katy and Rob. _Make sure you stay in touch with them_. Alec had said that. Was it too late, after Sherlock, after Alec? He didn't know what he wanted any more.

But if he said _no_ or _too late_ , that was that, wasn't it? Last chance gone to fix things, and for what? For a man he barely knew? He couldn't throw away fifteen years for one night in Plymouth. Or for a man without a heart, he'd dreamed of with his head full of poison. He had to try one more time, didn't he?

"I think...I think we should try getting back together again," he said, even as he wondered what _together_ meant any more.

***

Later that evening Greg pulled Alec's card out of his coat pocket. He wondered if he ought to throw it away, so that Ruth didn't find it. But it looked like just another bit of tourist stuff, she wouldn't suspect anything.

_Even so, it might be better_ , he thought, but he knew he wouldn't. It might be easier to pretend even to himself that last night had never happened, but easier often turned out harder in the long run. He'd slept with a bloke and enjoyed it. He'd slept with _Alec_ and he ought at least to let him know what was happening. He slowly typed out a text:

_Thanks for all your help with Baskerville case. Pleased to report I'm safe back at home with wife and kids now. Best wishes, Greg Lestrade_

He wished he could be braver, that he didn't have to worry about anything he wrote being used in evidence against him, but there were some things better left unsaid. Best just to send the oblique message of thanks but no thanks. He didn't think Alec was expecting more than a one night stand, but he didn't want to muck him around.

A couple of minutes after he sent the message, a reply pinged back:

_Hope it works out OK with yr wife. Webboards saying MI5 killed Dr F & closed off Hollow to retrieve Hound DNA. Good for my business! A  _  
   
Greg couldn't help smiling. Trust Alec to see the disaster as a marketing opportunity; and he was obviously fine about them not taking things further. If only it was as easy working out what he was going to say to Sherlock the next time he saw him.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Why _had_ Greg spent so many years believing Sherlock could ever change?

The next time Greg saw Sherlock, it was because a plane had fallen out of the sky over Dusseldorf. But one of its passengers hadn't; instead John Coniston was dead in a car boot in Southwark. Very dead. It was the kind of impossible case that Sherlock loved. Greg didn't hear a squeak of protest out of his team when he suggested they called him in: they were so far out of their depth with this one it was almost funny.

It wasn't funny seeing Sherlock again. Greg decided to play it brusque, act as if Baskerville hadn't changed anything. Just stick to telling Sherlock the facts about the case. Only to find, of course, that that was all that Sherlock was interested in. Sherlock walked away from the crime scene saying something vague about two ideas, ignoring Greg completely. Still, as long as he came up with the goods...

No word from Sherlock for almost a week, but then if it was terrorists who had brought down the plane, he might be onto something really big.  Then a text arrived from John:

_Greg, fancy a pub night? I could do with a break from 221B. JHW_

***  

"You OK?" he asked John once they were sitting in St Thomas Street, with a pint of Directors each.

"Fine," John said unconvincingly. He looked frazzled, but it always took at least half a pint for him to open up. "Just wanted to see how you were. You're back with Ruth, are you? Sorry, I should have said something before. I saw you were wearing your ring again."

The other thing about John was that he was the world's worst liar.

"Sherlock saw the ring last week and he only thought to mention it to you today," Greg supplied, and John grinning ruefully and drank some more of his beer. You couldn't hope to hide things from Sherlock; Greg hadn't worried about that.

"We're giving it another try," he said. "I mean marriage isn't easy, but being on your own, it's no fun either. Not at my age."

"Not at any age," John said. Greg wondered if he should ask about _his_ girlfriend, but he wasn't sure of the name of the current one. Still, even if John's girlfriends came and went, he always had Sherlock as a constant. Which reminded him...

"Any progress on the Coniston case?" he asked, and then could have kicked himself. Couldn't he just forget work for one evening? But he couldn't, of course, and from John's slow smile, he'd expected that.

"No," John replied. "Sherlock's baffled. None of his hypotheses hold water. Whatever happened to the man wasn't just improbable, but impossible."

"There must be some leads. I hoped he might be able to get something at the airport end."

"He's given up on the case. He's doing some chemical experiments at the moment, something about classifying mould residues."

"He's _given up_?" It wasn't the first time Greg had known Sherlock be stumped, but it was a pretty rare occurrence.

"I put a blog post up saying he was stuck. And he complained about me doing it, but he didn't tell me to take it down."

"You put a blog post up saying Sherlock Holmes couldn't solve a case?" Greg said. That was...Christ, John knew how to put the boot in, didn't he? You thought he was too forgiving to be true and then he did _that_ to Sherlock's ego.

"People want to know that Sherlock's human," John said. "They're interested in him. I had over 100 hits in the first ten minutes after I put that post up.  And you should see the comments."

There was more to it than that, there had to be. He'd been too busy in the last couple of days to check John's blog, but there'd been something that had bothered him the last time he'd looked.

"You haven't posted anything about Baskerville yet," he said. John's smile faded and he looked down gloomily into his beer.

"Mycroft won't let me," he said. "Said if I didn't wait till he'd had my post officially cleared, he'd get me blacklisted by every internet service provider in Britain."

"But everybody knows there was something fishy going on at Baskerville."

"Yeah, but it's all still rumour," John replied. "Mycroft tells me there are cabinet ministers reading my blog now. He says I can only post about the case when he can promise the Prime Minister that Baskerville's been sorted out fully. So I suspect he's going to be up to his ears in luminous rabbits for months."

"Luminous rabbits?" Greg demanded. "What do _they_ do to you?"

"Well, they might nibble your fingers, I suppose. It's not the animals down at Baskerville you need to worry about, Greg. It's bloody mad scientists with no idea about ethics." There was an edge to John's voice now. "Do you know what Sherlock did when we were down there?"

_Oh fuck_ , Greg thought. They'd _all_ got gassed that evening, hadn't they; if he'd started fantasising about Sherlock, what the hell had _John_ done?

No, John was implying it was something Sherlock had done to John, not the other way round. But that still left all kinds of worrying possibilities.

"The gas screws with your mind," he said hastily. "You know it does. Whatever Sherlock did, he didn't mean it."

"Oh, he meant this," John said wearily. "He didn't know it was the fog making us see things, he thought Frankland's drug was in the sugar from Henry Knight's house. So he dosed me with that without telling me and then locked me up in a lab at Baskerville to see what happened."

_Fucking hell_ , Greg thought, _what kind of man does that to his friend?_ Then he worked it out. "So the sugar didn't affect you?"

"No," John said, draining the last of his pint. "But there were faulty pipes in the lab and I inhaled some of the gas from them. Then I freaked out, thought the hound was after me, and ended up locking myself in a cage and begging Sherlock to rescue me." He paused. "You know what the stuff's like, and he deliberately tried to give it to me. Not sure if I should put _that_ in my blog post."

What was it he'd told John once? If they were lucky one day Sherlock might be a good man. Wasn't going to happen, was it? Stupid to think it had ever been possible.

"You're his best friend – his only friend – and he does that?" Greg demanded. "Why the hell do you put up with him?"

John was silent for a moment, and then he said slowly. "Same reason you do, I guess. What would either of us do without Sherlock?"

"Get to finish my holiday in Spain," Greg replied, because it was only turning it into a joke that made it bearable.

"I always thought..." John said and ground to a halt. "All the name-calling and taking the mickey out of Sherlock at Scotland Yard, I always thought it was just coz Anderson and Donovan were petty-minded little so-and-so's. I didn't realise...there are times I want to _kill_ him. There are times I want to hurt him, just to prove that he can be hurt."

He looked intently at Greg. "Don't you feel that as well? When you've been working with him for what, five years, and he claims he can't even remember your first name?"

"He is what he is," Greg said automatically, and it was suddenly, oddly, as if his mind was finally registering what he was saying. Why _had_ he spent so many years believing Sherlock could ever change?

"He isn't human," John protested.

"He's more human than he lets on," Greg said. "He cares about you, you know that. He's prepared to work with me."

"Is that enough?"

"You said it yourself," he replied. "I need his help, you get a kick out of chasing round shooting things. If we want that, we have to put up with him being a prat." He sighed. "Shit, we shouldn't be spending the evening sitting round and belly-aching about Sherlock. Let's have another pint and talk about the football instead, for god's sake."

***

He went home after the second pint, because he didn't want to wind up Ruth by coming home late. Or get pissed in case he said something rash. Though John doubtless wouldn't bat an eyelid if he told him about Plymouth. John'd been in the army, he'd probably seen his share of confused soldiers who'd had sex with a bloke for the first time.

Except Greg wasn't confused anymore; it all seemed clearer now. It had been good with Alec, but he still fancied Ruth as well. Maybe he was bisexual, but that didn't make any difference when he was married. And as for Sherlock...

As for Sherlock, it was as if all the subconscious excuses his mind had made over the years had vanished. He couldn't have Sherlock because of Ruth. He couldn't have Sherlock because he was a bloke and Greg was straight. He couldn't have Sherlock because Sherlock didn't want anyone close to him.

The real reason was that Sherlock wasn't interested in sex. Maybe it was being with Alec that had made Greg realise that, remembering what young men were normally like, alive with hormones, whether they were gay or straight. If Sherlock had wanted someone, he'd have found a boyfriend or girlfriend in the years Greg had known him. He could have anyone he wanted, looking like that.  But Sherlock hadn't found anyone, because that wasn't what he wanted. All that mattered was the same faces around him as he concentrated on a crime scene. And having John at his side so he didn't make too big an idiot of himself.

Well, as far as he was concerned, John was welcome to the prat. Greg had his own life to lead; better things to do than hold Sherlock's hand and try and look out for him. He had a family; he had a job. Sherlock could do what the hell he liked. It was time for Greg to stop worrying about him.

***       

John was right – making fun of Sherlock _was_ a way to let off steam when it all got too much. Greg avidly read the ever-accumulating comments on John's _Sherlock Holmes Baffled_ blog post; he sniggered at the "Hat-Man and Robin" headline. He even took a video of a dopey Sherlock sitting in the gutter outside Irene Adler's house in Belgravia discussing cases with a woman who wasn't there. Then he helped John get Sherlock back to Baker Street and up seventeen stairs – Sherlock tripping over every damn one of them, so it seemed. A joke was a joke, but Sherlock damaging himself permanently wouldn't be so funny.

"So why did Sherlock go and see Irene Adler?" he asked John, once Sherlock was safely tucked up in bed. There was an obvious reason why any other man might be going to see her, but if Sherlock was into "recreational scolding", he'd surely have shacked up with DS Donovan years ago.

John collapsed into his chair and looked warily at Greg.

"I won't arrest you, whatever you've done," Greg told him hastily. "But if Sherlock's mixed up in something dangerous, I need to know."

"We didn't _think_ it was going to be dangerous," John said, and Greg could swear that for once the mad bastard actually meant it, that they hadn't been looking for trouble. "Sherlock had a client who wanted us to retrieve some compromising photos Irene had taken. We got there, we were about to get our hands on them, and some gang jumped us _and_ Irene."

"Looking for the same thing?"

"Don't think so." John frowned. "They were Americans, our client's English."

"And you fought them off. Who was the one who shot the bloke dead and where's the gun?" Funny how he was always have to cover up for Sherlock and John getting their hands on guns. Well, not funny, so much as infuriating.

"Irene," John replied, which was a surprise. "She had some kind of weapon rigged up to fire when the safe was opened."

"You and Sherlock weren't doing any shooting?"

"Sherlock fired one of the pistols to alert the police. We didn't use them otherwise, and we were just acting in self-defence. Irene's the one you should be charging, after what she did to Sherlock."

"One more thing I need to know." Greg folded his arms and stared down at John. "Who's your client?"

As he expected, he just got a mulish look in reply.

"Well, tell me this much," Greg went on. "Is it someone in the Met?" He saw the momentary surprise on John's expressive face, before it closed back into its frown.

John shook his head. "No, he said. "Important, but not connected to the police." He paused and then added, "Why did you think she...they might be?"

"Because Irene Adler has clients in the Met, which is why we've never been able to do anything about her." She'd been thumbing her nose at the Vice Squad for the best part of ten years; she was older than she looked.

John was staring at the carpet now. "Maybe in your team, Greg," he muttered. "She knew all about the hiker case, and she said something about getting the information from a policeman."

_Shit_ , thought Greg. "Anything more specific?"

"No," John said. "And I suppose it doesn't have to be the Met that was leaking rather than the Thames Valley guys..."

"Not necessarily my team either. It was an impossible murder, that was why DCI Carter asked our advice. Everyone on our floor was talking about it, trying to come up with a solution." He tried to think back to the morning; had anyone he knew been behaving suspiciously – well, more suspiciously than usual? It'd be impossible to check who might have talked to Adler, but he was pretty certain Sally wasn't her type. Anyone else he could rule out?

"Can't be Anderson, at least," he said.

"Why?" John replied. "I mean Irene said policeman, but she may have been speaking loosely..."

"He's on holiday," Greg replied. "Bird-watching in the Scottish Highlands somewhere – I think he said the island of Uffa.  Point is, he was going to be impossible to contact; mobiles don't work up there and there's only one landline on the island." It was odd he thought of Anderson immediately, but he was the only one of his team he could think of who was screwed up enough to get involved with a dominatrix.

Though maybe that was just him being prejudiced, he reminded himself. People did all kinds of surprising things sexually; he was proof of that.

"So what happens now?" John asked.

"You tell me. I take it you didn't get the photos off Irene?" John shook his head. "I'll try and get an arrest warrant issued for her. We could go for actual bodily harm, for doping Sherlock, if you're prepared to give a statement. Or are you gonna want to protect her?" John was quite capable of being stupidly chivalrous if there was a beautiful woman involved.

"No," John said firmly. "Irene could have killed Sherlock if she'd got the dosage wrong. And she didn't give a toss about her maid, the tall redhead who got knocked out. Is she OK, by the way?"

"There didn't seem to be anything we could hold her for, so she got taken off to hospital. Dunno if she's been discharged yet. I suppose you want to stay here tonight and keep an eye on Sherlock, rather than come down to the Yard now and give a statement?"

"I...you've seen the state he's in. I don't want Mrs Hudson to have to deal with him."

"Fair enough. I may need you in tomorrow, but I suspect I'm going to be told to leave Ms Adler well alone." Greg headed for the door and then turned to say, "And if Sherlock does have any ideas about how we can track down the mole in the Met, let me know, would you?"

*** 

"How was your day?" Ruth asked when he got home.

"Bit mixed," he said, trying to think what he should tell her. Ruth asked conscientiously every day about his work now, just as Greg carefully checked what the kids had been up to at school. But there was something more important to ask about today.

"How was the class?" he asked. Ruth had decided that now Emily was in Year 1, she was going to do a Return to Nursing Practice course.

"Terrifying," Ruth replied, as she stuck his dinner in the microwave to reheat. "The IT system made me feel a complete ignoramus. Nursing never used to be like this: it's all filling in the paperwork and no time for the patients now."

"It's twelve years," he told her. "It's gonna take a bit of time to adjust, but I know you can do it."

"I suppose so," she said. "So what was the bit mixed at work about?"

"New death this afternoon in central London," Greg said, clearing himself a space to eat on the kitchen table. "Bloke who got shot was a foreign national, don't know if we're going to get it or Counter Terrorism are. But Thames Valley asked us for help with a suspicious death this morning and we've probably cracked their case."

"Already?"

"We think it was death by misadventure; passer-by hit with a boomerang. Have to check up on it, of course, see if someone was around with one at the time." Well, the first thing to do was check that Sherlock still thought it was the right solution when he wasn't off his face. But it was the most plausible suggestion Greg had heard so far.

"Someone wandering around southern England with a boomerang?" Ruth said. "That's weird." She handed him a plate full of homemade shepherd's pie; one of his favourites.

_Not the weirdest thing about today_. But he didn't want to say anything about Irene Adler, let alone about Sherlock's encounter with her. So much he didn't feel he could tell Ruth; sometimes it seemed that every conversation with her was about what was not said. Maybe it was inevitable when you got back together again; you know how thin the ice was still.

"So has Katy heard about the school orchestra?" he asked instead, and they were back on the safe ground of family discussions. The children they shared, even when they didn't seem to share much else. More important than Irene Adler, after all, or even Sherlock Holmes.

***   

Sherlock's Christmas present for Greg was a stabbing. Well, it was solving a stabbing a week before Christmas and not calling Greg an idiot while doing so, which was practically a present in itself. An art student had had a quarrel with his boyfriend and got a penknife in the guts. Sherlock found the murder weapon, hidden in a piece of pottery, of all the bizarre places, so they were able to charge Beppo Rovito with murder.

When Mycroft Holmes turned up unexpectedly in Greg's office the next day, Greg presumed it was something to do with that. Maybe the dead man hadn't just been an art student with a juvenile taste in projects and a complicated love-life. Maybe he'd been a spy or a terrorist. But instead, Mycroft plonked down on Greg's desk a piece of paper that looked oddly familiar.

"Have you seen this?" Mycroft demanded, in his normal talking-to-the-mentally-inadequate tone.

"Invitation to a Christmas party at 221B," Greg replied. "Surprised you got sent one as well; John must have got a bit carried away with the Christmas cheer."

"Why is Sherlock agreeing to this tomfoolery?"

"Because John and Mrs Hudson are twisting his arm," Greg said. "Look, I know it's not Sherlock's idea of fun, but John said he wasn't doing anything else this Christmas. If he was supposed to be spending it with you, I suggest you talk to him directly. It's nothing to do with me."

"Are you attending this party?"

Greg leaned back in his chair. It was very tempting to tell Mycroft it was none of his sodding business, but he did have to work with the man sometimes. And if there was some kind of Holmes family bust-up all of Sherlock's acquaintances were bound to catch the flak somehow. Sherlock wasn't good at being quietly unhappy.

"I wasn't planning to go. We're off down to Dorset Boxing Day morning to see Ruth's parents, so we'll probably still be packing the evening beforehand."

"Is anyone else from Scotland Yard going?"

"Doubt they've been invited.  But I can't see them going even if they were, to be honest. Your brother's not exactly popular."

"Despite the fact that without him the Met would have an even more abysmal clear-up rate?" Greg had forgotten that in his own slightly more refined way, Mycroft could be every bit as obnoxious as Sherlock.

"I haven't got time to sit around here all day playing guessing games with you," he told him, glaring up at the snooty git. "What do you want me to do and why?"

"I would like you to go to the party. And reassure me afterwards that Sherlock is in a _stable_ condition."

"What on earth are you talking about?"

Mycroft's face took on a constipated look as he said, reluctantly, "I want to be sure that he is not using any illegal substances."

"What?" Greg thought back frantically. Had there been anything odd about Sherlock's behaviour the last time he saw him? Well, odder than you'd expect from Sherlock.

"I have no evidence," Mycroft said hastily. "I...if I say that's why I worry, it would doubtless sound ridiculous."

He was a snooty git, but he also must have had a grandstand seat for Sherlock Holmes: The Junkie Years. And it was Mycroft who'd got Sherlock to stop using, however, ham-fistedly.  Maybe that entitled him to be paranoid.

"Why now?" Greg asked, scanning the stiff figure in front of him. "What are the risk factors for him using?"

"Boredom. Frustration. He always used to find Christmas stressful. Too much interaction with other people."

"If you're worried, talk to John. He lives with the man and he's a doctor. If there's something wrong, he'll be the first to know."

"John doesn't trust me."

"So you want me to be your spy?" He'd almost felt sympathetic to the arsehole for a moment.

"I'm asking you for a favour," Mycroft said patiently. "John would like you there, even if Sherlock is unlikely to be grateful. If you go, I don't feel obliged to, and everyone will be much happier."

"I'm not spying on him."

" _Please_ ," Mycroft said, and it wasn't fair how human he could suddenly sound. "I have a bad feeling about this party. I'd like someone there who I can rely on."

"I'll see if Ruth's OK about me going," Greg said, "but if I do, you'll owe me big time, Mycroft."

***

Ruth was fine about him going off: leave her to pack in peace, she said.

"We'll get far more in the suitcases if I do them all," she said, turning it into a joke. Strong, dependable, competent Ruth. He wished suddenly that she could come to the party, that he could show everyone at 221B how wonderful she was. But if she did, Sherlock would doubtless deduce something embarrassing about her, and it would all turn sour.

He'd forgotten that Sherlock didn't need someone present to deduce everything about them. And the best of his deductions – when you heard them, you knew at once he was right. The pattern of Ruth's behaviour had always been there; he'd just never seen it.

He didn't make a scene, just slid away soon after Mycroft phoned to say they'd found Irene Adler's corpse. He wasn't the only person to be having a crappy Christmas, then.

***

Ruth was watching television when he got home, but she switched it off when he came in the door.

"I wasn't expecting you back so soon," she said, and then suddenly added, "You look terrible. Was Sherlock being a pain?"

"Sherlock said..." he began, and then forced himself to go on. "He said you were having an affair. With that PE teacher at Robert's school. Mr Morgan, isn't it?"

Ruth sat on the sofa and stared down at the remote, as if working out what button to press to stop her life, rewind it.

"It's over," she said at last. "I don't know how he knew, but it's over."

Greg sat down heavily in the big armchair, his legs feeling unsteady. "You did have an affair?" He kept his voice quiet, because if he shouted he would fall apart.

"A few months," Ruth said, and her voice was desperately quiet too. "I...he paid attention to me. He made me feel I mattered."

"And I didn't?"

"The work comes first with you, it always has." Ruth's voice started to choke now. "But you know what? It was the same with Gareth. The school found out, and the head-teacher was furious. Breaking up a parent's marriage – not setting a good example, she said. She was talking about him having to change jobs and he _loves_ that school. So he broke it off."

"The school knew as well? Did everyone? Was it just me who didn't realise?"

"The children didn't know. I wasn't sure, you see. I didn't know what to tell you."

"The truth?"

"How could I tell you I didn't know what I wanted!" Ruth burst out. "It felt so good with Gareth sometimes but so wrong, as well. And then he told me it was all over."

"That was why you came back was it, because you'd been dumped?" Greg snarled. He could feel the urge to hurt building in him, to scream and yell, call her every filthy name under the sun...

"I came back to try and make it work," Ruth said quietly. "Because if it kept on going wrong, maybe it was me that was the problem, not you or Gareth. Maybe if I could just try harder..." She came to a halt, and he knew she was close to crying.

Suddenly his anger was gone, to be replaced by infinite weariness. He didn't want to have to do this any more. He didn't want Ruth to have to do this, to pretend it was all fine.

"It doesn't work like that," he said, and Ruth nodded. "We can't...we've been kidding ourselves, haven't we? It's over."

Ruth nodded again. She looked up at him at last and said, "I'm sorry."

There was probably something more he should say, but he didn't know what. They sat in silence for a few moments, as he concentrated on not crying, and then Ruth said:

"Do you want to come down to Dorset with the rest of us tomorrow?"

"No."

"I'll go and unpack your stuff," she said, getting up hastily. "I'll talk to the kids while I'm down there. Tell them everything. We can work out what to do when we get back."

"OK," he said, and that was it. Ruth went upstairs to the suitcases again; Greg sat there in the living room and wished he was dead.

***

It was 9 p.m. on Boxing Day before Greg cracked and texted Sherlock. He sat in the silent kitchen and slowly typed out:

_The affair only lasted a few months. How did you know about it? GL_

Sherlock's reply was prompt:

_A PE teacher called Gareth Morgan agrees to meet a pupil's mother on the afternoon of the England-Wales rugby match? Highly suspicious. SH_

Sherlock had overheard one phone call of his to Ruth – back in the spring, it must have been. And he'd worked that out.

_Why didn't you tell me then? GL_

_We had a bomber to catch. Didn't seem a priority. SH_

Greg switched off his phone before he said something unforgivable to Sherlock. He ought to eat something. He ought not to drink anything more. He was going to go into work tomorrow and catch whoever had killed Irene Adler. That was the first thing to do. Once he'd got going on a case, it would all seem better.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If only Sherlock had co-operated, talked to Greg, things might have been different.

Sherlock had obviously decided to finish 2010 as he'd started it, by being a complete tosser. Actually, almost literally a tosser: on New Year's Eve he threw a burglar out of the window at 221B. Greg made some stupid crack about how often he'd done it and Sherlock called him "Detective Inspector" in reply, which meant he was _really_ up to no good. Greg decided he'd better find out who the burglar was, just so he knew exactly how much trouble they were in before he made any rash promises to Sherlock about covering the mess up.

He didn't recognise the burglar when he got to the hospital – bit hard to, with all the tubes the doctors had stuck into him. But easy to tell _what_ he was. Big man, middle-aged, and the clothes they'd cut off him were smart-casual. Not your average London burglar and an American as well. There was only one reason Greg could think of for an American to be menacing 221B quite so openly. And that also meant...it was like suddenly realising that two plus two equalled four. He'd been so slow.

He stood outside the hospital, smoked a fag and then dialled Sherlock's number. He hoped he would reply for once; this wasn't the sort of matter you could discuss in texts.

"What's Irene Adler playing at?" he enquired, when Sherlock finally answered.

Sherlock's tone was dry. "Decomposing. She died last week, if you remember."

"She's alive," he said, with complete certainty. "She faked her own death." There was a brief pause at the other end.

"What makes you say that?" Sherlock said. He hadn't simply called him an idiot, which meant Greg's hunch _had_ been right.

"Your odd behaviour the last few days."

"I haven't done anything. I've just been in the flat."

"That's the odd behaviour. You know, Sherlock, I've seen hundreds of people who've had a friend murdered. Some of them might sit at home doing nothing; you wouldn't. You'd want – you'd need – to find who killed Irene. But you haven't been near the case. And you were the one who identified her body, weren't you?

"Yes." He could practically _see_ Sherlock's dismissive look.

"I reckon you realised at once that it wasn't her. And kept your mouth shut till you knew what she was up to."

"That came perilously near actual deduction, Lestrade. Don't let the Yard know or they'll throw you out for competence."

That was probably the nearest he was ever going to get to a compliment from Sherlock; Greg allowed himself a tiny moment of pleasure before he went on,

"So where is Irene Adler now?"

"I don't know."

"You must do. That's why the Americans are after you, isn't it, to track her down? "

"Wrong again, inspector."

It had been too good to last, obviously, but it took more than Sherlock being obnoxious to deter Greg.

"What were they up to, then?"

"I'm in possession of information given to me by Irene, and certain foreign powers are interested in it."

"If they're willing to break into Baker Street in broad daylight, the stuff's too bloody dangerous for you to hang onto. If you don't want the police to have it, then give it to Mycroft." Greg paused and then added. "John can act as a go-between if you're not talking to one another again." They could probably halve the crime statistics, he always reckoned, if the two Holmeses actually got on with one another.

"There's no point. The material's encrypted and if I can't unlock it, the Yard and the Service certainly can't."

"So why did Irene give it to you?"

"I'm not sure. The motives of women are inscrutable sometimes. She may want me to unlock her phone, for some reason; she may simply have an unusual method of flirting."

Oh bloody hell. Sherlock was angling for a second round with the woman, was he?

"Last time you tangled with her, you got an armful of dope," he reminded him. "Watch your step."

"I'm quite capable of looking after myself." Sherlock's tone was icy. "I suggest you concentrate on your own department."

"You reckon?"

"Yes. Irene Adler has an informant within Scotland Yard, possibly even within your own team. Have your superiors announce that the investigation into her death is being closed, because you have eye-witness evidence that she's still alive. And then simply observe who's not surprised at that news."

Shit, he thought. He'd forgotten all about Irene's mole in the Met. "Do you have any idea–"

"–Not at the moment," Sherlock broke in. "If I unlock the phone I can tell you exactly who the man is, so if you'll excuse me, I'll get back to that. Have a happy New Year, Lestrade. Goodbye."

***

Greg had only one New Year's resolution for 2011: keep buggering on. He was back in Sally's cousin's flat in Deptford and Ruth was being co-operative about the divorce. She was happy to keep on letting him see the kids, who seemed almost relieved that their parents had finally made up their minds.

Sherlock was a pain, of course, but no worse than usual. And after his mistakes of the summer, he seemed to be on a winning streak. Finding the stolen Turner painting; catching Peter Ricoletti after thirty years. And getting Alexander Holder back safely from his kidnappers.

It had been collaring Ricoletti that had got the Met happy; the brass hats had agreed to Greg's suggestion of a formal presentation to Sherlock at last. And he'd watched detectives queuing up to speak to Sherlock afterwards, to shake him by the hand, to thank him. Only to get insulted by Sherlock, because having his genius appreciated didn't seem to be what he wanted after all. But the Yarders didn't seem to mind any more; even Donovan and Anderson's suggestion about the deer-stalker had been only mildly malicious.

But it was getting Holder back that put a smile on Greg's lips for the first time since Christmas. The memory of standing in a squalid alley in Newham, when the kidnapped banker staggered from a lock-up, his mouth still duct-taped shut. John Watson at Holder's side, supporting him; Sherlock on the other, tapping away at his phone, still looking for further clues. Greg had been convinced that the banker was a goner the moment the ransom note had arrived, but thanks to Sherlock there he was, safe.

Greg had to turn off the telly when the press conference came on, and he saw Holder standing with his kids, because he was stupidly near tears. Sherlock might be the biggest arsehole in creation, but this was why Greg worked with him: because sometimes he didn't just solve murders, he saved people's lives.

And then he went and got a beer and sat on the sofa and turned on the telly again to find something, anything else to watch. Holder might be able to go back to his family, but he couldn't.

***

He wondered occasionally if he should ask Sally for advice. Doubtless among her huge network of friends and relatives, there'd be someone willing to date a copper. But a middle-aged bloke with three kids going through a divorce? No sensible woman would get involved with him.

No sensible bloke either. Every now and then, he found himself thinking about phoning Alec. But what the hell could he say, after their last conversation? And even if Alec was still interested, Greg could hardly go swanning off to Devon to see him. Not when he was doing his level best to spend every day off with his kids. Leave it for a few months and see how he felt then, he decided. No hurry, after all.

He was still thinking that in March, when Moriarty came back.

***

It wasn't the worst day of Greg's life; he'd had so many terrible days over his career that it was hard to pick just one. But there was a moment when it seemed like the longest day ever, some loop that he was trapped in forever as yet another security system collapsed. Even when they'd got Moriarty in custody, Greg kept on staring at his phone, expecting another message, the next move in Moriarty's impossible game.

It didn't come, which meant it was time to try and ensure it never would. Moriarty might get life for attempted robbery, but there was no guarantee of that. And Greg wasn't going to see prison doors opening legally for the man ever again if he could help it.

The CPS prosecutor was Jane Okafor, which was good news; she and Sally were old mates, and Jane was a battler. She sounded enthusiastic about adding extra charges to Moriarty's sheet.

"As long as you've got some evidence," she said. "I thought you couldn't trace the bomber last year."

"We knew who he was," Greg told her, "We just didn't know how to get hold of him." Jane listened as he told her the details, her quick, dark eyes scanning his face.

"So all you have definitely connecting this man to the bombings is the identification by Holmes and Watson," she said. "We'll need statements from them, and pre-trial interviews."

Greg nodded and noted that down. "And if you have those?"

"No promises," Jane replied, "but if there's any way to get the man, we'll go for it. I was involved in the Janus Cars prosecution; I heard about the young man who was put in a bomb- jacket. I won't let you down on this one, Greg."

***

But a week later when Jane phoned him, he could tell from the edge in her voice that things had gone wrong.

"Bad news about the James Moriarty case, Greg. We're not proceeding with the bombing charges and the Tower of London affair is being reduced to attempted burglary."

"It's gotta be robbery," Greg protested. "Moriarty knocked a security guard out."

"We can't take any chances."

"But we have two witnesses that Moriarty strapped a man into a bomb-jacket!"

"One of whom we can't use. There's no way that I am putting Dr Watson onto the stand."

"Why not?" Greg forced himself not to yell. It wasn't Jane's fault this was happening; it'd be some senior manager trying to cover his arse, because he thought the case might go pear-shaped.

"John Watson was invalided out of the army with mental health problems. He's devoted to Sherlock Holmes. He's got a temper. The other side's obvious tactic is to ask whether he's just saying what Sherlock Holmes told him to, and follow that up with a query about his exact relationship with Mr Holmes. Five minutes of that kind of needling, and I'd lay you long odds he'll either take a swing at counsel for the defence or give them an earful. Which will piss off the judge and wreck his credibility with the jury."

It rang horribly true; you wanted John by your side in a physical battle, not a verbal one.

"There's still Sherlock," he protested, half-heartedly.

"If there was any way we could keep _him_ off the witness stand I'd take it," Jane replied promptly. "The man's unbearable."

"It's not about whether he's _nice_ , it's whether a jury will believe him."

"In court, a credible witness is one who tells a simple, confident, coherent story. Not one who's so full of himself that he can't be arsed to give straightforward answers to obvious questions."

"You can't just ignore his evidence," Greg said, considering the many, many possible ways that Sherlock had got up Jane's nose when she'd met him. Would it be any help to tell her that he was like that with everyone?

"I know," Jane said, with exasperation. "If we don't call Holmes as a witness, Moriarty's side might well do so. As far as I can see, their only possible tactics are to try and muddy the waters, claim there's some vast government conspiracy. And Sherlock Holmes is the obvious red herring, given the rumours about his connections in high places."

"Moriarty was out to get Sherlock; the message he wrote on the glass proves that."

"I don't know what the defence will be. But if James Moriarty's been caught red-handed and he's not pleading guilty, he must have some trick up his sleeve."

"You think he can get away with this?"

"No," Jane says. "We can nail him for attempted burglary, and when we do he's going down for life. It doesn't matter what the sentencing guidelines say, they won't let him out again. And once he's put away, someone somewhere will talk, tell us about all the other things he's done. He's a nasty piece of work, but I think Mr Moriarty's gone too far this time."

***

The day that Moriarty walked free probably _was_ the worst day of Greg's life. The most blatant bit of jury-nobbling for years and nothing anyone could do about it. And then all the old, vaguely plausible rumours were being aired again.  About a network of corrupt coppers in the Met protecting criminals, about secret MI5 plots. Followed by the finger-pointing, as everyone tried to shift the blame for the disaster of the trial.

Greg wondered afterwards if that had been what really did for Sherlock. Hard to claim he cared about solving crimes when the whole country knew he'd taken apart the counsel for the prosecution, damaging his own side's case. Had that been when Sally decided to bring down Sherlock? When she'd seen him publically humiliate a black woman for the crime of not being as clever as him?

No, that wasn't fair. His team might dislike Sherlock, but they were still willing to work with him when the Bruhl children were snatched a couple of months later. And if only Sherlock had co-operated, talked to them, things might have been different. Because Sally was wrong about Sherlock being responsible for the kidnapping, but she was dead right that there was _something_ fishy going on.

***

He still remembered Sally standing in his office the night before Sherlock died, arms crossed, laying her theory out, as Anderson watched and nodded.

"So who are we looking for otherwise? If it's not Sherlock, who else would have done this?" she demanded at the end.

"Someone trying to get at Rufus Bruhl," Greg replied promptly. "He's a bloody ambassador, he's gonna be a target."

He'd trained Sally too well. "Bruhl's got no serious money of his own, and why target an ambassador to the US? And if someone's trying to send a message to him or the FCO, they'd have kept a tighter guard over the kids, made sure they couldn't be found."

"So it's some random pervert," Greg replied weakly. But as he suspected, that was an argument so pathetic even Anderson wouldn't swallow it.

"That kind of sadist wouldn't walk off and abandon his victims. He'd want to see the children die, he'd get off on it," Anderson said. "Why would anyone just leave Max and Claudette there in the warehouse?"

"Because they aren't important to whoever kidnapped them," Sally went on relentlessly. "They're just pawns in some kind of game. And who do we know thinks crime is just a game?"

It couldn't be Sherlock, Greg knew that. But Sally was right that Sherlock had to know more than he was saying. And Greg couldn't keep on letting him get away with his tricks; it was undermining morale.

He was almost tempted to try another drugs bust, but they were way beyond that sort of power play. He'd just have to go and talk to Sherlock, make it clear that he had to be given something, anything. He needed an explanation from Sherlock and he needed it now.

***

He didn't get an explanation from Sherlock; he didn't get anything. _Six years_ working with that bastard, and when Greg went round practically begging him for help, all he got was Sherlock saying "No, Inspector." Refusing to come to Scotland Yard because it might look bad, as if he didn't almost live there half the time. Talking vaguely about Moriarty, saying he wasn't willing to play his game.

Sherlock didn't seem to understand that he was already part of the game, like it or not. How had he not realised that if he didn't come with Greg voluntarily, he'd end up being arrested?

It made no sense to him, but he wasn't a bloody high-functioning sociopath. Greg risked his neck arguing with the DCS and then phoning Sherlock to warn him, and what happened? Did the man run off beforehand, as anyone sane would do? No, he had to steal a bloody gun and make a song and dance about his escape. As he watched Sherlock run off with John trailing in his wake, there was a tiny part of Greg that wished he _would_ get shot resisting arrest, just to teach him not to be such a dickhead.

There was a much larger part that knew that the only way he was going to get out of this mess with his career intact was if Sherlock solved the case. Meanwhile, his best hope was to keep his head down and get the big boys in. He brought up a number on the phone that he reserved for dire emergencies.

He got an anonymous answer phone on the other end, not the bland haughtiness of Mycroft's voice. But that didn't matter; they'd get his message to Mycroft somehow. _Sherlock's on the run, and they're trying to pin the Bruhl kidnapping on him. He's in deep shit and I'm probably about to be suspended. You've got contacts: you need to use them now._

***

It was like the old cartoons in the end; you ran off the cliff, but it was only when you looked down that you fell. He went into work the next day, ignoring the whispers as people saw him, and there was no sign of Sally. It was Anderson's day off, as well, he realised when he checked the rota. He gave what remained of his team their orders: _Check if the Bruhls have any financial or marital problems. Two of you back to Addlestone to ask for any sightings of a man with children. Another down to St Aldate's with a picture of Moriarty, in case he was involved in some way._

They all went off, but he didn't know if they were going to do what he wanted. If they'd already realised that he was a dead man walking. He sighed and reached for the pile of paperwork from yesterday and wondered how long before someone came and told him the bad news.

***

He didn't expect the bad news to be that Sherlock was dead. That was when someone showed him the article in the _Sun_ , which he'd somehow missed. He sat in his office, and people talked at him, telling him all the rumours, and then he got the call from the Deputy Assistant Commissioner. He listened silently as he was told that he was suspended, under investigation for possible misconduct, unauthorized disclosure of information, corruption and god knew what else. He was only surprised no-one tried to claim he'd been nicking money from the tea fund. He was toast, he knew that. Designated scapegoat for the failed prosecution of Moriarty, even though the whole thing made no sense.

It didn't need to make sense. It just had to hold together long enough for the tabloids to report that the problem had been down to a single rotten apple, a rogue DI ignoring all proper procedure. The Met making a presentation to Sherlock a few months ago – well, he'd helped them in a purely unofficial capacity, like any citizen. Nothing to see here, move along now.

It wasn't a surprise. As he sat in his flat that evening, Greg realised he'd known all along working with Sherlock would end in tears. But he couldn't have helped it; couldn't have walked away from him. Sherlock had mattered too much to do that.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Greg's not quite as alone as he thought he was.

The next nasty surprise was the door-stepping. Though Greg should probably have expected that, he supposed. Every newspaper was desperate to get their own follow-up scoop on Sherlock, and he'd been pictured enough at Sherlock's side to be an obvious possible source. A pack of reporters followed him down the street as he went off to the supermarket the next day, yelling repeated offers at him "to tell his side of the story".

He knew better than to trust any of them. He switched off his phone, picked up a week's load of supplies, and headed back to the flat to wait out the siege. They could make up stories without his help, thank you very much. He wasn't going to have his words twisted to harm Sherlock or the Met.

He watched television, but not the news; found internet sites that discussed motorbikes, not true crime. It had quietened down a bit outside, but he was still getting several reporters trying to get into his flat every day. Claiming they were delivering pizzas or come to read the gas meter.

"Fuck off or I'll arrest you," he told one particularly persistent reporter, who'd made it into the building and was literally calling through his letter-box.

Stupid threat to make, he thought, when she'd finally given up and gone. He couldn't arrest her; he didn't have his warrant card any more. For a moment he considered phoning John and asking if he could have one back from Sherlock's cache, but then he remembered. He shook his head – God, he was so tired he couldn't think straight. He'd read John's first angry blogpost in the few minutes before it had been taken down. The one that raged at Mycroft, at the police, at the "people who killed Sherlock". But Greg hadn't dared contact John, even to send his sympathies. He had to stay away from him and all his friends or he might get them into more trouble. The first thing you did when investigating a bent copper was tap their phone, read their e-mail. The Met would be looking for collusion, conspiracies, someone to pin some crime on. If John said something rash to him, they'd both be in even deeper shit.

***

He risked a look at some tabloid websites eventually, and discovered that the big news was that a Premier League footballer had got himself involved with a porn star. No stories in the last twenty-four hours about Sherlock, he realised. The papers had hounded him to his death and now they'd lost interest. In less than a week. Four days. No, five. Because it was Wednesday today, not Tuesday; with nothing happening, he kept on getting confused.

Which meant – _oh shit_ – that he'd been supposed to take Emily to her swimming lesson yesterday and he hadn't done it. He switched his phone on – voicemail full up with messages, almost all from eager reporters. But among them, here was Ruth: _Greg, I heard on the news about a DI being suspended: I presume it's you. If you need any help, let me know._ And another unexpected message, in a slightly nervous West Country burr: _I'd like to leave a message for Inspector Greg Lestrade. This is Alec Fletcher Robinson from Grimpen. Could you phone me back, please?_

Why had Alec phoned, Greg wondered, even as he dialled Ruth's number. The phone rang and rang, but finally she picked up.

"Hi," she said, "I almost didn't answer, but then I realised it might be you, not the _Daily Mail_."

"O God, have the reporters been bothering you as well?"

"I told them I didn't know what you'd been doing since we split up," Ruth replied calmly. "And that I'd never met Sherlock Holmes, which is almost true."

"I'm sorry," Greg said wearily. "I should have warned you, and I should have sorted out about Emily, and it's a complete fucking mess–"

"–It's OK," Ruth broke in, and she sounded the way he remembered her, a woman who could cope with anything. "I got Karen to take Emily swimming and I told Robert and Katy to ignore all the reporters, they were just chasing after us because _Big Brother_ wasn't on. They seem to have stopped hassling us in the last twenty-four hours, though."

"Thank God for that."

"So what _is_ going on, Greg?" Ruth asked. He wondered how much he should tell her, who was listening in. Still anyone who was would doubtless know the score already.

"Professional Standards are investigating me," he said. "For making unauthorised disclosures of confidential information to Sherlock."

"But they _knew_ he was working with you."

"I've got nothing in writing to say my superiors agreed to that. And given the claims that Sherlock was a fake–"

"He _wasn't_ ," Ruth said, and the conviction in her voice was oddly heartening.

"You know what the papers are saying," he pointed out reluctantly.

"Sherlock Holmes was a horrible man, but he wasn't a fake. You'd have spotted him if he was."

_Thank you_ , he breathed, because it was good to know there was someone else out there who still believed in Sherlock. And then his body slumped, as he remembered the situation.

"It doesn't matter if he was a fake or not. The Met want me to leave quietly."

"Have they told you that?"

"Not yet, but I know too much." The cover-up at Baskerville; Irene Adler's faked death; Mycroft kidnapping John. The list went on and on. "They wouldn't want all that coming out."

"So you'll be cleared?" Ruth asked hopefully.

"I'll be offered the chance to take early retirement on the grounds of ill-health. They'll say I made  'errors of judgement'  because of the stress of the divorce. I keep my pension, they give me a reference."

"And everyone's left believing you're guilty of _something_ ," Ruth protested.

"If I fight it'll be worse." He'd drag the rest of his friends down as well, if he tried, he'd worked that out in the last few sleepless nights. John Watson, for the Pink Lady killing. All the other coppers who'd used Sherlock over the years, or turned a blind eye to his misbehaviour. Someone had to pay for the Met's embarrassment, and better it was just him than Dimmock and Gregson and the rest as well.

"It's not fair!" Ruth almost shouted, and he wished she was here with him and he could give her a hug.

"I know it's not," he said instead. "But there's nothing we can do about it."

There was a long silence at the other end of the phone; he could imagine the angry expression on Ruth's face.

"It'll take them a few weeks to sort out the paperwork, I expect," Greg said at last. "Till them, I'm just suspended. On full pay, but not expected to do anything. So if you need me to come round and put the shelves up in the kitchen now would be a good time." It'd been, what, nearly two years he'd been promising to do that?

"That would be good," Ruth said quietly. "The kids would like to see you...Thursday week? No, all of next week's frantic, but the week after that. Monday 15th, maybe?"

"That'd be fine," he told her. No need to reach for his diary; none of the meetings and courses and deadlines he'd scribbled in there were happening any more.

"Is about ten OK?" Ruth asked.

"It's a date," he said, and wondered for a split-second if it could be. But no, they couldn't go back now, too much past to be rewritten.

"See you then," Ruth said, and she was gone.

***

It wasn't till Friday morning, as he was frying himself some bacon, that Greg remembered about Alec. Better find out what was going on, he thought, once he'd finished his breakfast. Check there's no problem.

"Alec, it's Greg Lestrade," he started to tell the answering service, and then Alec's voice cut in:

"Thanks for calling back, Greg. How are you?"

"Fine," he said automatically, "well, you know..." His voice died away.

"I heard on the news you'd been suspended," Alec said. "After Mr Holmes killed himself."

"Yeah. They got that bit right," Greg replied cautiously.

"Your picture was in all the papers," Alec went on. "And lots of stories claiming Mr Holmes was a fake. But he wasn't, was he, Greg?"

"No. But the truth doesn't matter much to the tabloids."

"Someone's got to clear his name," Alec went on, "but I reckoned if you'd been suspended, you couldn't talk to the papers, case it got you into more trouble. So I've been talking to people down at Grimpen."

"What do you mean?"

"Gary and Billy, and Mr Henry and Dr Stapleton as well. Between us we can tell people what happened at Baskerville. That Mr Holmes couldn't have faked the Hound, because it was Dr Frankland who was to blame for everything."

"You can't...you'll get into trouble with the authorities if you start talking about Baskerville."

"Mr Henry has the address of that TV reporter," Alec said. "Once we've been on TV, they can't do nothing to us, or everyone will know what we're saying is true."

"They could discredit you. Accuse you of...things." Greg hesitated, wondering if he dared be more explicit.

"I'm out to my parents," Alec replied immediately. "And my friends know as well. If I tell the TV people what happened, what does it matter if I'm gay or straight? Might even get a bit of publicity for the tours." He paused and then added: "I won't say anything about you being down here."

"Alec...I, I..." Greg shook his head. He didn't know what to say. Alec and the others barely knew Sherlock and yet they were prepared to stick up for him. And here he was, doing nothing.

"You OK, aren't you?" Alec demanded. "They haven't got at you for...you know, Plymouth? Coz if you're back with your wife–"

"–I'm not," he broke in. "Not any more. We're getting a divorce. Things... it just didn't work out."

There was a long silence at the other end. And then Alec's voice, gentle now: "Sorry about that, Greg. Look, it must be a bad time, but there is just one thing. I wanted to ask if you knew anything about Mr Brook?"

_Mr Brook?_ Greg's brain had obviously seized up, because it took far too long to register. Rich Brook, who was really Jim Moriarty. Sherlock had told him that, and Sherlock wasn't a fake and he was almost always right. Jim Moriarty, the master criminal who'd broken into the Tower of London and brought down Sherlock. His gut clenched as he finally realised what Alec was suggesting.

"Stay away from him, he's dangerous," he blurted out.

"You reckon?"

It wouldn't be enough for Moriarty just to destroy Sherlock, would it? He'd always wanted more. If he got the chance to hurt more people who Sherlock had helped...

"Look Alec, you...you and the others mustn't do this. Don't go to the TV people or the papers or anyone. "

"Why not?"

"If you do, you'll make yourself a target for the criminal who's behind all this."

"So are you in danger?" Alec asked and Greg could hear the fear in his voice.

"No," he said, hoping he sounded convincing. "I'm not a threat to Mor...any more. No-one's going to believe a copper kicked out of the Met. But if you and your friends kick up a stink, I don't know what might happen."

"So what do we do?"

"Nothing," Greg said. "Keep quiet, at least for now. There are people working on this who'll clear Sherlock." It was a lie, of course, but if he could just make it sound convincing...Or maybe it wasn't a lie. Sherlock still had friends after all.

"You're sure there's nothing else I can do?" said Alec, and there was a hopefulness in his voice that caught at Greg's stomach in an entirely different way.

"Come to London," he said, without thinking, and winced as he heard Alec's voice, suddenly tentative, reply:

"I can't right now, Greg..."

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that," he replied hastily. What the fuck had he been thinking? "Forget it, it doesn't matter."

"No," Alec said. "I wanna come. I wanna see you again. But it's the height of the season, you see?"

_The tourist season_ , Greg's brain told him belatedly. _Alec has a job, remember? Thing you used to have_.

"So when...when do you get off?" he asked tentatively.

"I finish end of October with Halloween," Alec said eagerly. "Nothing then till the Christmas Hound specials in December. Got the whole of November free."

"Would you like to come then?" London in November: hardly ideal. Well, unless you were planning to stay indoors most of the time...

"Yeah, that'd be good," Alec said. "Only ever been to London once, when I was a kid. There's lots I'd like to see."

He sounded so _young_. _What the hell am I doing_ , Greg thought, but he wanted to see Alec again. Whatever happened, it would be good to have his company.

"Work out what you want to see," he told him. "We'll talk nearer the time. And I'll see you in November."

"Take care, Greg," Alec said.

***

Stupid thing to do, Greg told himself, once he'd got off the phone. Alec coming would just mean trouble for them both. Never mind Ruth probably doing her nut, what were his team going to think about their boss running round with his sort-of-boyfriend?

Not Ruth's business who he slept with any more, though. And he didn't have a team left to gossip about him. Nothing left of all he'd worked for. Didn't matter what he did, did it?

Except it did, suddenly. He'd been sitting moping in his flat and forgetting that that bastard Jim Moriarty was out there. Probably planning how he could outdo breaking into the Bank of England and framing Sherlock. Someone had to try and stop him, and it looked like it was down to him.

Even more stupid to think that he could catch Moriarty if Sherlock hadn't been able to. But he knew more about him than anyone else at the Met. Least he could do was get everything down on paper so someone brighter than him could work on it. And maybe, just maybe, he could spot some chink in Moriarty's armour.

***

It took him five hours of writing and rewriting, but he finally had a file detailing what he knew about Jim Moriarty. Not much there, but him being "Rich Brook" had to be the starting point of any investigation. You couldn't create a false identity and leave no traces.

But what could he do while he was suspended? He couldn't go charging off to Catkin Productions and ask them if Rich Brook really had worked on _Time for the Storyteller_ since 2009. The Met would crucify him for pulling a stunt like that. But who could he find who watched the show and might know one way or the other? Only kids even younger than Emily, probably.

And then a memory abruptly came back. Ruth, sitting at a computer a few years ago, laughing while she read some online forum. _It's all about which of the CBeebies presenters you fancy_ , she'd told him. Jim Moriarty was a good-looking man. And who watched _Time for the Storyteller_? Bored mums who probably let off steam on the internet every now and then.

He found Mumsnet after a while and after a quick scan of their talkboards was almost tempted to post something anonymously himself asking how you told your kids that you might possibly be in love with a bloke? But that wasn't what he was here for. Lots of posts about children's TV, but was there anything about Brook?

He stopped around midnight, when he couldn't see straight and there were several posters he was tempted to track down and murder. But he had something at least. There were people posting in the last few days who "remembered" seeing Rich Brook as The Storyteller. But there was no-one who mentioned him before then, even though he'd supposedly been on the show for two years.

It wasn't proof: you couldn't prove something negative like that. And his superiors would just laugh if he told them. But it did show that Moriarty had cut corners setting up the fake ID. He hadn't taken over someone else's identity; he hadn't led a double life. He must be relying on fake documents and blackmail. A strong enough story to fool a not-too-bright journalist like Kitty Riley. But give it a hard enough push and it might just collapse.

But the only man who could be guaranteed to spot the flaws was dead. Rich Brook had lasted just long enough to outlive Sherlock. Greg might possibly be able to untangle the details of how Moriarty had set up Kitty's scoop. But he would never, ever be fast enough to catch up with him. No-one would.

_Wrong_. It was as if he suddenly heard Sherlock in his head. And what was it he'd told Greg once, at the end of some long rant about the Melas case? _If the art of the detective began and ended in reasoning from an arm-chair, my brother would be the greatest investigator that ever lived. As it is, he's just a lazy sod with a head full of plausible theories._

_Mycroft Holmes_ , Greg thought, and realised he'd said the name out loud. The one man alive who was a match for Moriarty, who might be able to bring him to justice.

Or maybe not. What was it John had claimed in his blog post? That Mycroft had captured Moriarty and then let him walk free. It sounded impossible, but it was hard to say anything was impossible where the Holmeses were concerned. Those brilliant, devious minds, always so many moves ahead that it was as if they were playing a different game to you. Well, he might have spent six years running after Sherlock, but he wasn't going anywhere near his brother again.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What does Greg do after Mycroft's revelations?

Maybe Mycroft was like Lord Voldemort, and if you said his name he could track you down from that alone. Because on Saturday evening, there he was, knocking on the door of Greg's flat. The view through the peephole made his nose look even beakier than normal. Greg had no idea why he was outside, but he could bloody well stay there. He'd had enough of the Holmeses, thank you very much.

A few more knocks, and then it went quiet. Too quiet. Greg somehow wasn't surprised when his phone beeped with a text alert.

_I'd prefer to talk in your flat. I have people available who can break down doors, but that would be messy and inconvenient for us both. MGH_

Greg didn't answer, but when he checked half an hour later the man was still standing out there, fingering his phone. You called Sherlock's bluff at your own risk. Probably the same with his brother.

"What do you want?" Greg demanded, when he finally opened the door. Mycroft walked in a little stiffly and sat down unerringly on the one comfortable chair in the flat.

"I have a proposal to make," he said. "But first, I have a confession."

"I'm suspended from the Met. I've never been a priest. Go and confess to somebody else." He'd spent more than six years not hitting Mycroft. Tonight might just be the night he cracked, and he suspected Mycroft was aware of that. Mycroft steepled his fingers in front of his face and said very quietly:

"I want to tell you how I inadvertently helped Moriarty attack Sherlock."

"I read about that in John's blog post," Greg said, sitting down opposite him and scowling. "He claims you put Moriarty in a cell, told him all about Sherlock and then let him walk free. That true?"

Mycroft nodded almost imperceptibly. 

"For a genius, you're pretty bloody stupid, aren't you, Mycroft?"

"It's more complicated than Dr Watson makes it sound, Lestrade," Mycroft replied, "though my performance was not much more impressive. I believe John also claimed I'd told him _why_ I was interrogating Moriarty?"

Greg sighed. "The key code. The way to break into anything. The Tower of London. The Bank of England. Pentonville."

"It doesn't exist," Mycroft said. "It can't exist. My experts told me that when I first heard the rumours of it last summer."

"Moriarty broke into those places. Simultaneously. I didn't bloody imagine it, did I?" Things that you thought you knew being ripped away, a world turned upside down. How could the Holmeses do it every single time?

"Moriarty didn't hack into any security systems; he bribed his way in everywhere."

"You mean you lied to John about the key code," Greg said. He leaned back on the sofa, shoved his hands in his pockets, so he _couldn't_ deck the bastard.

Mycroft nodded. "It was necessary at that point. I can explain, but I'll need to go back to the swimming pool incident last year."

Only Mycroft could describe his brother nearly blowing himself and several other people up as an i _ncident_ , Greg thought angrily.

"Yeah," he said. "Read that on John's blog as well. That's why there was no fifth pip in the pips bomber case, because the last bomb-jacket was for John."

"But John's account of what happened never made sense, did it? You must surely have realised that?"

Greg nodded and Mycroft stared at him, in that aggravating way that meant _I want you to tell me your deductions so I can trump them_. Greg was almost tempted to stay silent, but if he did the bastard might just sit in his room all night.

"There were a whole load of things that didn't fit," Greg said. "Why did Sherlock turn up at the pool? Why didn't Moriarty kill him then and there? Why didn't _Sherlock_ kill Moriarty when he got the chance? God knows, the idiot's never been worried about dying before now."

"You left out the obvious question," Mycroft said, and the way he said "obvious" was so like Sherlock that Greg's hands clenched in his pockets. "Why didn't he pursue the case further, try to track Moriarty down? A criminal mastermind on the loose and yet Sherlock is content to chase after the petty miscreants of London. Hardly seems much of a challenge, does it?"

"He said he was leaving Moriarty to you."

"Does that sound like Sherlock?"

_I'm not having this_ , Greg decided, and pulled his hand out of his pocket to glare ostentatiously at his watch. "I'll give you ten minutes, Mycroft. I'm sick of guessing games and hints. You can tell me what happened, or you can fuck off."

He watched Mycroft blink at the obscenity and he could almost see the subtle mind readjusting its approach.

"There was only one logical reason for Sherlock not to pursue Moriarty further," Mycroft said, at last, sitting up a little straighter."Fear."

"You're telling me Sherlock was scared? He took on an armed hitman with a cleaning spray once. He's the stupidest bloody risk-taker I've ever met."

"But even Sherlock has limits and at the swimming pool he realised them," Mycroft said, and a hint of smugness had crept into his voice. "He would have been prepared to sacrifice himself to finish off Moriarty. But the thought of Dr Watson dying terrified him. The first friend he'd ever had. The first man he'd ever cared about."

_Yeah, go and rub it in,_ Greg said to himself, and then he saw Mycroft's eyes read that thought, and God, didn't that just make it worse?

"You want facts, Inspector," Mycroft said, with that calculating snooty smile of his. "Sherlock's _regard_ for John Watson is one of them. Oh, he mistreats him on occasion, but a serious threat to Dr Watson and Sherlock will crumble. Moriarty knew that; Sherlock knew he knew that. In order to protect his friend, he left Moriarty to me."

Greg stared at the grubby patches on his carpet, wondering exactly what it was that Mycroft had come to 'confess'. A thought suddenly occurred to him.

"Why hadn't you been onto Moriarty before?" he said. "I thought if someone farted in London you knew about it."

"Until last spring, Moriarty wasn't my problem," Mycroft replied calmly. "Crime isn't my division, to put it in terms you'd understand.  Not even organised crime. But espionage is. When Sherlock handed the Bruce-Partington plans to Moriarty, he made him a legitimate target for me."

"Ten minutes and no guessing games," Greg said softly, looking up at him. "What plans?"

"The details don't matter," Mycroft said, with a flick of his hand. "Sherlock retrieved some lost MoD secrets and offered them to Moriarty. Via his website, which was I how I became aware of the deal."

"And?"

"And I was able to authorise an immediate investigation of Moriarty on the back of that. We traced the phone call made to him at the swimming pool. Too late, of course, to take any action, but it gave us another name. Another dabbler in intelligence matters: Irene Adler."

Mycroft's smile was bleak now. "We'd always taken her to be a minor political risk only, but when we investigated her properly, her network was far wider than expected. It seemed possible that one of our own counter-terrorism operations was in danger. We believed that she had passed on information to Moriarty, who in turn was going to sell it on to this country's enemies."

"So that was why you grabbed him?" Maybe he _was_ going to get given the whole picture at last.

"Yes," Mycroft said. "Last summer, while Sherlock was chasing phantom hounds in Devon. A rather trivial case in most ways, but finding out about Dr Frankland's hallucinogen was handy."

"You used that on Moriarty?" Greg demanded, sitting up.

"Physical pressure was having no effect."

"You mean torture."

"An ugly word for an ineffective practice. I don't enjoy using it and the new drug appeared to have no long-term effects. And it often induces an unusual openness."

"You're shit scared and you don't know what you're saying," Greg growled. God, Mycroft would make him feel sorry for _Moriarty_ at this rate.

"Its effects include disinhibition: an inability to disguise emotional responses. The more primitive emotions, in particular, tend to be revealed, the aspects of oneself that are normally concealed. Sherlock's fears about his superior rationality, for example..."

Mycroft's voice tailed off and Greg waited for some snide remark about what _he'd_ done down at Grimpen. The bastard would be bound to know. But Mycroft's eyes slide away from Greg's as he went on:

"Moriarty's deepest fears were obvious, of course. He worried that Sherlock would ultimately prove to be cleverer and more exciting than him. That for all of Moriarty's tricks, he was just a poor shadow, an inadequate copy of Sherlock's genius. I fed those fears. I told Moriarty all about Sherlock, how brilliant and strange he'd been even as a boy, how he'd become a man who could do anything, extraordinary beyond words."

Had it been the one time Mycroft had felt free to talk about Sherlock, Greg suddenly wondered. "So what did you get from him?"

"What I needed. I listened to him rave while his head was full of the drug, grandiose plans for defeating Sherlock and myself. Listened for hours for the one scrap of intelligence that would tell us that Coventry – that was the codeword for our operation – had been compromised. But it didn't come. We'd underestimated Irene Adler. She had the information, but she wasn't selling it to Moriarty until she'd decoded it."

"Moriarty didn't have the information you wanted," Greg said slowly. "So after you'd pumped him full of mind-warping drugs and told him everything he needed to know about Sherlock , you then opened the prison door and said, _Thanks for staying with us_. What the fuck did you think you were doing?"

"I had no choice," Mycroft said, and he had that glassy stare that Greg remembered from Sherlock, like he was pulling back memories from some deep-buried place. "The Americans insisted he should be released, and since Coventry was intended to protect their assets, I felt forced to acquiesce."

"So why did they want Moriarty free?" It wasn't like the bloody Americans to let _anyone_ go, Greg reckoned.

"They wanted us to track him, in the hope that he might put us on the trail of his terrorist contacts. Meanwhile, they would retrieve the information from Irene."

"But they..." Greg began and then stopped, as the penny finally dropped.  "You double-crossed the Americans. You sent Sherlock after Irene."

"Once I became aware of the inadequacy of the CIA plan, it seemed essential. It wasn't technically in breach of our agreement for me to do so."

"But you didn't tell...Oh God, you devious shit. You didn't tell the Americans about Sherlock _or_ Sherlock about the Americans, did you?"

"I couldn't warn my brother," Mycroft replied, his chin going up. "He might have started asking awkward questions about _why_ the CIA were interested in Ms Adler. I was worried he would spot the connection to Moriarty and refuse to help me."

"Irene Adler was working for Moriarty, and so she knew all about Sherlock, and you didn't think to warn him to watch his back? Fuck it, I'm glad _I'm_ not your brother."

"Even so, Sherlock delivered what I needed, eventually. Irene's phone, unlocked."

"This was after Irene had come back from the dead, was it?" Greg asked and then realised it must have been. Sherlock had still been trying to unlock the phone when the Americans had attacked Baker Street, he remembered now.

"Did Sherlock tell you she was still alive?" Mycroft asked.

"I worked it out. I'm not entirely stupid." There was a significant silence from Mycroft.

"OK," Greg went on. "So what happened then? You'd got Irene's phone and all the information on that. Did that give you a lead on Moriarty?"

"That was our hope. Sherlock managed to unlock her phone in May, just after Moriarty's trial. We had reason to know that Irene didn't keep back-ups of her photos, so we presumed she was a spent force."  Mycroft paused, staring at the carpet. "That was my real mistake, underestimating Irene. I took away her security and turned her out to fend for herself."

"What did she do?" Greg demanded and then it dawned on him. Irene would still have had one weapon left: her own seductive mind and body. And there was one obvious target for her. "What did she do to Sherlock?"

"Nothing," Mycroft replied, looking slightly affronted. "She never saw him again; she died in Pakistan a few months later. And yes, we did check quite thoroughly this time that it was her. But before she died, she tried to make another bargain with Moriarty. She gave him the only information she had left."

It was like talking to Sherlock all over again. Well, no point in pretending to be clever. "What was that?"

"The names of all her clients."

"And?" Christ, had _his_ brain rotted after a month off work? "If Moriarty didn't have the photos, the names were no good to him."

"A man who's just walked free after breaking into the Tower of London? When he gets in touch with you and tells you he's got Irene's photos, do you think you'd have the nerve to call his bluff?"

It was a fair point. Greg slumped on his uncomfortable sofa and tried to think it through steadily, logically. "So Moriarty had a whole load of extra people to blackmail. But he had a criminal network already _and_ he could threaten people. Had no problem nobbling the jury, did he? Did it really make any difference him getting Irene's contacts as well?"

"Yes, it did," Mycroft said, and his head went down in his hands. "Moriarty's network is a criminal one, as you so rightly say. Irene's contacts were at the heart of government and the media. I knew in outline what Moriarty's plan was; I gathered that when we drugged him. His dream was to plant stories in the newspapers discrediting Sherlock."

"And you didn't try to stop him?"

"I didn't think I needed to. His plan couldn't possibly work. The British libel laws are strict: not even the tabloids would be prepared to print a story that couldn't hold up to scrutiny."

"The _Sun_ did though, didn't it? Or don't you count the _Sun_ as a newspaper?"

"They were prepared to let Kitty Riley's story through." Mycroft raised his head. "Probably because at least six senior figures in News International had their details on Irene Adler's phone. I suppose you must expect anyone involved with the _Sun_ to be susceptible to a glamorous dominatrix."

He gave an unconvincing smile at Greg and then went on. "Irene's names also helped Moriarty in another way. He'd already planned to set up the fake Rich Brook identity, but it was by blackmailing Irene's clients that he found people who could vouch for Brook's credibility. Who were prepared to say that they'd been his producer or his co-presenter."

"So you told Moriarty all Sherlock's secrets, and he helped Irene play Sherlock for a sucker," Greg said. "And then, thanks to her, Moriarty was able to get his story published and so Sherlock killed himself. God, you screwed up this time, Mycroft." Just because it made more sense now, it didn't make it any better. So many lies told, so much vital information concealed. And at the end of all that clever planning by the Holmeses, one of them lying smashed on a pavement, and Mycroft here still trying to justify his mistakes.

"But you don't see the real mystery even now, do you?" Mycroft said, and Greg was on his feet and heading for the bastard. Then common sense kicked in, and his hand drew back from Mycroft's throat. He watched relief sweep over Mycroft's paled face.

"I would be grateful if you could sit down again, DI Lestrade," Mycroft said in a voice that almost sounded calm. "I'm sorry, I should have remembered that you're under considerable stress. What I _meant_ was that it is surely unlike Sherlock to kill himself simply because others believed he was a fraud. Don't you agree?"

Fuck, he hadn't thought of that, but the moment Mycroft said it, it made sense. Sherlock had an ego the size of a planet; no way would he have taken Kitty Riley's article as anything more than a challenge.

"You're right," he muttered. "Should have seen that. Sherlock always fights back."

"Not always," Mycroft said, pulling out a handkerchief and dabbing at his brow, and at last Greg had got on his wavelength.

"Sherlock jumped to protect John," he said, as that bit fell into place. Sherlock hadn't been able to manage a good life, but he had maybe managed a good death. _Greater love hath no man than that he lay down his life for his friend_. He probably ought to say something more to Mycroft, he supposed, but he didn't know what.

"It was what I assumed had happened," Mycroft said eventually. "I've been keeping watch over John ever since, to check that there was no continuing threat to him, but there's no sign of it." He paused. "But further evidence has now appeared, suggesting another possibility."

Greg sat back. "What evidence?" he said wearily. Always another layer, another complication.

"I told you Sherlock had got hold of Irene's phone and given it to me. We'd concentrated on identifying her most exalted clients, along with anyone who might have overseas connections. And after Irene's death, the identification of the other photos was no longer regarded as a priority. Until we realised that those people might now be being blackmailed by Moriarty." Mycroft reached into an inside pocket of his suit and produced a photo, which he handed to Greg. "Do you recognise this man?"

The photo showed a white man in his early thirties; short brown hair dishevelled, mouth distended with some kind of gag. Without that the face would be moderately handsome, Greg thought, with its deep-set eyes and strong features. And yes, the man was somehow familiar. Not from mug-shots though...a witness in a recent case? And then it suddenly clicked.

"Andrew Chater," he said. "He's a civilian working for the Met. One of the crime analysts in the Homicide Task Force."

"And a regular client of Irene Adler."

"He must be the leak," Greg said. "Sherlock said there was someone in the Met passing on information to Irene."

"Sherlock didn't tell _me_ that," Mycroft said indignantly.

"Yeah, well," Greg said, "he wasn't big on information-sharing either." He _had_ done what Sherlock suggested and had the Murder Investigation Teams told about Irene faking her death, and no-one had behaved oddly. But he might have missed Chater's reaction; HTF always seemed to be off in a huddle on their own.

"A couple of my men went to see him yesterday," Mycroft said. "And what they found out was sufficiently odd for him to be brought to me. On the night of the 28th July, Chater had received orders from Moriarty. At lunchtime the next day he was to tell you that he had a contact with vital information about the Bruhl case, and then take you to a pub in Bow. A pub which I have reason to know is run by a man in Moriarty's pay."

"They were planning to trap me?"

"They were planning to kill you," Mycroft replied. "Chater was told to make sure he wasn't seen leaving Scotland Yard with you. Once he had delivered you to the pub he should immediately make himself scarce and establish an alibi for the next hour."

"He was the bait," Greg said. He shook his head. "It doesn't make sense."

"Why not?"

"Moriarty's style is more bombs and snipers, isn't it?"

"Your patterns of movement are particularly irregular," Mycroft replied. "Notoriously, you don't go home when you're supposed to, and you've even been known to sleep in your office. Even a team of snipers couldn't be sure of being able to get a clean shot at you at the right time. Moriarty had to make sure you ended up where he wanted you and on schedule."

"But that was insanely risky for Chater," Greg protested. "He must have known he was putting himself in line to be an accessory to murder. Keeping those pictures hidden wouldn't have been worth it. Liking kinky sex isn't a crime."

"He was leaking information to Irene," Mycroft replied. "I suspect if we dig deeper we'll find he's already been forced to commit other offences. Moriarty's an expert at turning the screws. If Chater's personal life _and_ his career were on the line, are you sure he wouldn't sell you out?"

Chater wouldn't be the first bloke at the Met to have got in far too deep and ending up committing a really serious crime. And yes, he'd have gone with Chater, of course he would. Walked into a trap, like the gullible fool he was. Greg could feel the sweat gathering on his palms.

"OK," he said, trying to sound tough, "so why am I still alive?"

"Chater was told one more thing. That if he heard before 1 p.m. that Sherlock Holmes was dead, he would no longer have to carry out the task. You can draw the obvious conclusion."

"The threat to me was being used as a weapon against Sherlock–"

"–To make him jump," Mycroft finished off his sentence.

"So why am I still alive?" Greg asked again, and it was easy to sound tough this time. "A choice between Sherlock and me dying. Not much of a choice for Sherlock, is it?" The next words came out without thinking. "It's not as if I'm John."

"I don't know why he made that decision," Mycroft replied, and for a moment he actually did look puzzled. "But he clearly did; there's no other possible explanation. And whatever his exact motive, the consequences remain the same."

"Sherlock's dead," Greg growled. Beneath all the tangled mess, one simple fact.

"And you are not." Mycroft's face had resumed its haughty expression. "You owe him your life, Inspector."

_And now you've come to collect,_ Greg realised.

"No," he said, and knew he didn't sound convincing.

"If someone, anyone else you knew had been forced to kill himself, you'd have been after the person responsible," Mycroft said. "You'd have been desperate to 'nail the bastard', wouldn't you? And this is Sherlock. Your colleague...your _friend_. And you plan to do nothing to avenge him?"

"I can't handle Moriarty." The truth he'd been trying to hide even from himself for a week slipped from his mouth and he glared at Mycroft. The bastard smirked back.

"You don't need to," Mycroft announced. "He's dead."

Just over a week since Sherlock jumped and Mycroft had finished Moriarty off already, Greg thought. Not bad going for a man who didn't much like leaving his own office.

"I didn't kill him," Mycroft added, as if he could read Greg's mind.

"What?" God, none of this made sense.

"Three days ago, the Service received an e-mail containing a set of co-ordinates for a location in Epping Forest. When we got there we found a grave with a body in it. A man in his early thirties, killed by a single shot."

"Do you think Moriarty can't fake deaths?" Greg growled.

"We'd taken DNA samples from him when we held him last year, and sent them to fifteen different police forces across the world. There was other information we collected as well, secured in a number of different locations. All of it matches with the body and with that of the man who was arrested this spring in the Tower of London."

Jim Moriarty was dead. Greg ought to be feeling more pleased than he was, but it all seemed too late now.

"Who killed him?"

"We don't know. He was probably killed on or about Friday 29th, the day that Sherlock died. I suspect Sherlock had his own booby-trap planned. Someone whose sole job, once Sherlock was dead, was to finish off Moriarty."

"John?" Greg asked, trying not to panic. They'd been no-one around to stop John doing something stupid, had there?

"No. Possibly someone from Sherlock's homeless network. Or one of the many criminals with whom Sherlock was friendly. Angelo Portinari, for example," Mycroft raised an eyebrow. "There are also other names that suggest themselves."

"I didn't kill him," Greg replied automatically, and then wished he hadn't sounded so defensive.

"Of course not," Mycroft said. "You're a policeman through and through. You would have tried to arrest Moriarty, not kill him. And it's because you're a policeman, that you're adrift at the moment. Take away your team and you're lost."

It was _so_ tempting just to take a swipe at Mycroft. Wipe that smile off his face the way some coppers Greg had known would have done, with fists and boots. But no, he mustn't react physically, whatever the provocation.

"You've had your ten minutes," he said instead. "Sherlock's dead and so is Moriarty. If you don't want to join them, I suggest you leave now."  
Mycroft smiled and didn't budge an inch.

"You haven't heard my proposal yet," he said.

"Whatever it is, I'm not interested."

"I'm offering you another role as an investigator."

"The Met won't take me back," Greg said.

Mycroft reached into his pocket again, and drew out some pieces of paper. "Your resignation letter from the Metropolitan Police Service," he said. "And your new Civil Service contract. You'll officially be employed by the Home Office, but seconded to work with the Serious Organised Crime Agency."

Clever, Greg thought. If he wasn't officially a copper any more, the Met could simply shelve their investigation of him. On the other hand, would SOCA really take him?

"Won't I have to be vetted?"

"They've already agreed to take you," Mycroft replied. "Your security clearance won't be a problem. SOCA want to make sure that Moriarty's criminal networks don't re-emerge without him, and you are going to be their team's point of liaison with the security service."

"You mean I'm to be your inside man in SOCA," Greg said slowly.

"I need someone I can trust," Mycroft said. "You're incorruptible and you can see this through."

"And if I tell you what you can do with your job?" _Just for once_ , Greg thought, _just for once I could tell a Holmes where to get off_. It was so bloody tempting.

The problem, of course, is that it would leave him where he was. Hung out to dry by the Met and then on the scrapheap. No, it was more than that. If he turned Mycroft down he'd be turning his back on everything he'd stood for. People had suffered from Moriarty's tricks, and someone had to make sure he didn't have any successors.

"We'd want you to start on August 16th," Mycroft said. "I believe you're occupied until then." His voice became even blander. "And if you need any time off in November, that can be arranged."

He knew all about Ruth, then. And Alec. Listening in on his calls, no doubte.

"Anything you don't know about me?" Greg asked grumpily.

"How you put up with Sherlock for so long," Mycroft replied promptly. "I'm aware of your personal life, but I'm not worried about it and nor will SOCA be. What matters is that the work comes first. But you know that already."

"If I accept."

"If you accept. I can leave the contract here and you can inspect it at your leisure if you prefer. My offer will remain open for a couple of days, at least."

Tempting to make Mycroft wait for an answer, but it wasn't justified. It wasn't how he'd expected to end up, Greg thought. Or even what he'd hoped for. But then, you worked with the insufferable genius you had, not the one you wanted. At least you did if, like him, you were desperate to bring criminals to justice.

"Where do you need me to sign?" he asked, as he reached out for the papers.


End file.
